The 38th annual Los Angeles Times Book Prizes were awarded this past Friday at the University of Southern California's Bovard Auditorium. The Mystery/Thriller category winner was Joyce Carol Oates for A Book of American Martyrs.
The Crime Writers of Canada announced the finalists for the annual Arthur Ellis Awards, which recognize the best in mystery, crime, and suspense writing in fiction and non-fiction by Canadian writers. Winners will be announced on May 24th at Arthur Ellis Awards Gala in Toronto. The books competing for Best Crime Novel include The Winners’ Circle, by Gail Bowen; The Party, by Robyn Harding; The White Angel, by John MacLachlan; Sleeping in the Ground, by Peter Robinson; and The Forgotten Girl, by Rio Youers.
Also from Canada, we have news of the 2018 nominees for the Bloody Words Light Mystery Award (fondly known as the Bony Blithe Award), which celebrates "light" crime fiction (cozies, capers, satires, and humorous books). The finalists include Cathy Ace, The Case of the Unsuitable Suitor; E.C. Bell, Dying on Second; Rickie Blair, Digging up Trouble; Vicki Delany, Hark the Herald Angels Slay; and Elizabeth J. Duncan, Much Ado About Murder. The award will be presented at the Bony Blithe Mini-con & Award Gala on May 25th in Toronto, Canada.
The 2018 Colorado Book Award Finalists include a category for Best Mystery and Best Thriller, and the nominees this year are mystery novels Dead Stop by Barbara Nickless, Fractured Families by Charlotte Hinger, and Hunting Hour by Margaret Mizushima; and thrillers Broken Slate by John A. Daly, Red Sky by Chris Goff, and Trafficked by Peg Brantley.
The 2018 CrimeFest Awards shortlists were also announced ahead of the annual event which this year celebrates its 10th anniversary on May 17-20 in Bristol, UK. The awards include the Audible Sounds of Crime for audiobooks, the eDunnit Award for ebooks, the Last Laugh Award for humorous crime, the H.R.F. Keating Award for nonfiction crime reference/true crime, and also awards for Best Children's and YA books. The winners will be announced at the CrimeFest Gala Awards Dinner hosted by Robert Thorogood on Saturday 19th May.
As part of the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival in Harrogate in July, Dead Good Books is bringing back the Dead Good Reader Awards where the public can nominate authors and books in the various categories and win a chance of snagging £200 worth of crime books and DVDs. Nominations close Friday May 21, 2018.
Ace Atkins is this year's Keynote Speaker at 5th Annual Mystery Fest Key West June 22-24. Atkins is a New York Times bestselling author of twenty-one novels, including the recent Robert B. Parker "Spenser" mysteries. Other headliners of the event include editor and publisher Otto Penzler, proprietor of the Mysterious Book Shop in New York City, and Special Guest Presenter Heather Graham. In addition to the usual panels and book signings, the festival includes a Conch Train mini-tour of Key West, an ice-cream social event with Ace Atkins and Otto Penzler at the historic Key West Lighthouse, and a Bloody Mary Morning breakfast at Key West’s historic Schooner Wharf Bar.
Unfortunately, the news isn't as good for another conference; NoirCon's Lou Boxer posted on Facebook that they are cancelling this year's event that was slated for the fall due to the passing of NoirCon co-founder and co-director. Those who have already registered will be refunded in full, but Boxer added that "Please note that NoirCon as an organization is not over. Deen would not have wanted what she helped build to fall. Once we reorganize, we will return."
Over on Elizabeth Foxwell's blog, The Bunburyist, she profiles a 1977 Los Angeles Times article in which author-critic Dorothy B. Hughes chose 23 selections for a "classic mystery library."
Although DNA has helped convicted many bad guys and exonerated innocent people, the forensic technology still has flaws. In once case, a man was framed by his own DNA for a brutal murder he didn't commit.
Here's a fun site to put on your bucket list: One of the foremost Sherlock Holmes collections is hidden away at a Toronto library.
Did you know your brain needs you to read every day? Well, now you do.
The latest poem at the 5-2 crime poetry weekly is "Picnic" by Gail Aldwin.
In the Q&A roundup, E. B. Davis interviewed author Tina Whittle over at Writers Who Kill about the sixth book in her Tai Randolph/Trey Seaver series, Necessary Ends; Graphic Policy welcomed Megan Abbott and Alison Gaylin to discuss writing Normandy Gold, a gritty vigilante thriller graphic novel from Hard Case Crime (with illustrations by Steve Scott); the Dorset Book Detective chatted with Paul D. Brazill about his writing, translations, and Brit Grit; and Deborah Kalb spoke with Sara Blaedel, author of the the Detective Louise Rick series who's penned a novel in a new series, The Undertaker's Daughter.
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