Strand Magazine Critics Awards Nominees

The Strand Magazine has announced its nominees for the 2011 Strand Magazine Critics Awards. Recognizing excellence in the field of mystery fiction, the Critics Awards were judged by a select group of book critics and journalists, from news venues such as USA Today, LA Times, Chicago Tribune, and several other daily papers.

Best First Novel:
The Hypnotist Lars Kepler (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
Sister by Rosamund Lupton (Crown)
Before I Go to Sleep by S.J. Watson (Harper)
The Boy in the Suitcase by Lene Kaaberbøl and Agnete Friis (Soho)
The Poison Tree by Erin Kelly (Pamela Dorman Books)

Best Novel
The Affair by Lee Child (Delacorte Press)
The Drop by Michael Connelly (Little, Brown and Company)
Buried Secrets by Joseph Finder (St Martin’s Press)
Death Comes to Pemberley by P.D. James (Knopf)
The Cut by George Pelecanos (Reagan Arthur Books)

Lifetime Achievement awards
Joseph Wambaugh
John Sandford

"This year’s awards are set for a tight finish, many of the judges were nearly unanimous in what they thought were their top ten books," said Andrew F. Gulli, the managing editor of The Strand. "The second round of voting should be very interesting."The awards will be presented at an invitation-only cocktail party, hosted by The Strand on July 11, 2012, in New York City.