CWA Dagger Longlists Announced!

The CWA announced The Gold Dagger and Steel Dagger Longlists. For the International Dagger Longlist, go Here.

The Gold Dagger Longlist

The Beautiful Dead	Belinda Bauer	Bantam Press
Dead Man’s Blues	Ray Celestin	Mantle
The Girl Before	J P Delaney	Quercus
Desperation Road	Michael Farris Smith	No Exit Press
Little Deaths	Emma Flint	Picador
The Dry	Jane Harper	Little Brown
Spook Street	Mick Herron	John Murray
Sirens	Joseph Knox	Doubleday
Ashes of Berlin	Luke McCallin	No Exit Press
The Girl in Green	Derek B. Miller	Faber & Faber
The Rising Man	Abir Muckerjee	Harvill Secker
Darktown	Thomas Mullen	Little Brown

The Ian Fleming Steel Dagger Longlist

You Will Know Me	Megan Abbott	Picador
Kill the Next One	Frederico Axat	Text Publishing
The Twenty Three	Linwood Barclay	Orion Fiction
The Killing Game	J S Carol	Bookouture
The Heat	Garry Disher	Text Publishing
A Hero in France	Alan Furst	Weidenfeld & Nicolson
We Go Around in the Night Consumed By Fire	Jules Grant	Myriad Editions
Moskva	Jack Grimood	Michael Joseph
The One Man	Andrew Gross	Macmillan
Redemption Road	John Hart	Hodder & Stoughton
Spook Street	Mick Herron	John Murray Publishers
Dark Asset	Adrian Magson	Severn House
Police at the Station and They Don’t Look Friendly	Adrian McKinty	Serpent’s Tail
The Constant Soldier	William Ryan	Mantle
The Rules of Backyard Cricket	Jack Serong	Text Publishing
Jericho’s War	Gerald Seymour	Hodder & Stoughton
The Kept Woman	Karin Slaughter	Century
Broken Heart	Tim Weaver	Penguin

The Gold Dagger for Non-Fiction Longlist

A Dangerous Place

	Simon Farquhar	The History Press Ltd
Close But No Cigar: A True Story of Prison Life in Castro’s Cuba	Stephen Purvis	Weidenfeld & Nicolson
The Scholl Case: The Deadly End of a Marriage	Anja Reich-Osang	Text Publishing
Arthur and Sherlock: Conan Doyle and the Creation of Holmes	Michael Sims	Bloomsbury Publishing
The Wicked Boy: The Mystery of a Victorian Child Murderer	Kate Summerscale	Bloomsbury Publishing
A Passing Fury: Searching for Justice at the End of World War II	A. T. Williams	Jonathan Cape
The Ice Age: A Journey into Crystal-Meth Addiction	Luke Williams	Scribe Publications
Another Day in the Death of America	Gary Younge	Guardian Faber Publishing

CWA Short Story Dagger Longlist

The Assassination by Leye Adenle in Sunshine Noir

Murder and its Motives by Martin Edwards in Motives for Murder
Alive or Dead by Michael Jecks in Motives for Murder
The Super Recogniser of Vik by Michael Ridpath in Motives for Murder
What You Were Fighting For by James Sallis in The Highway Kind
The Trials of Margaret by LC Tyler in Motives for Murder
Snakeskin by Ovidia Yu in Sunshine Noir CWA Endeavor Historical Dagger Longlist The Devil’s Feast M.J. Carter Fig Tree The Coroner’s Daughter Andrew Hughes Doubleday Ireland The Black Friar S.G. MacLean Quercus The Ashes of Berlin Luke McCallin No Exit Press The Long Drop Denise Mina Harvill Secker A Rising Man Abir Mukherjee Harvill Secker Darktown Thomas Mullen Little, Brown By Gaslight Steven Price Point Blank The City in Darkness Michael Russell Constable Dark Asylum E.S. Thomson Constable

Father Anselm and the Discourtesy of Death: Guest post by William Brodrick

Augustinian friar-turned lawyer William Brodrick presents Father Anselm, lawyer-turned Augustinian friar-turned amateur detective, in this thrilling and revelatory new novel, The Discourtesy of Death (The Overlook Press · Publication Date: August 2, 2016). More than a simple whodunnit, this book--and all the books of the Father Anselm series, soon to be released from Overlook--invokes serious contemporary issues, deepening the pursuit of justice for Anselm and the reader alike. William Brodrick, in a career change that reverses that of his character Father Anselm's, was an Augustinian friar before leaving in order to become a practicing barrister. His novels include The Sixth Lamentation, The Gardens of the Dead, A Whispered Name, The Day of the Lie, The Discourtesy of Death, The Silent Ones, and the latest The Discourtesy of Death. He won the Crime Writers' Association Gold Dagger award in 2009 for A Whispered Name. 

William Brodrick:
Father Anselm and the Discourtesy of Death

Mysteries are fiction with a moral concern. Even when they are supposedly light and entertaining, questions about guilt and responsilbity, justice and mercy, right and wrong, remain central to the story. Which is why they are captivating and, dare I say it, important. Because – speaking for myself – it is when I come across something that is both entertaining and serious that I am most profoundly engaged.

Inevitably, then, the investigator in a mystery has a lot of responsibility. He or she must solve the crime. They must set things right. Restore the balance in favour of what is good, against the incursion of evil. But, if they are so inclined, they can also try and make sense of what has happened. Ask the questions we all ask when life gets messy and things swing out of control. And this is what I have tried to do with Father Anselm. Or, to be more precise, this is what Father Anselm has tried to do with me ... because one of the mysteries about writing is that characters tell you who they are and what they’re going to do. They take control and telling their story becomes a kind of willing cooperation. I’d imagined Anselm to be a former lawyer who’d become a monk who is then thrust into situations against his will – and that is who he is – but I only really met him, so to speak, in the books. His concern went beneath the resolution of a given crisis. He tried to bring justice into situations well beyond the reach of the courts. His eye was on the welfare of the perpetrator, too, as well as the victim. He wanted to understand the criminal as much as explain the crime. And so Anselm showed himself to be an investigator with a very personal sort of mission: to try and bring about some redemption, for everyone, here and now, in impossible circumstances.

Having a serious purpose doesn’t mean we can’t have a laugh. Anselm’s home, Larkwood Priory, may be a monastery, but it is populated with characters whose idiosyncrasies overwhelm any gravitas: a self-important archivist who’s permanently indignant, an aged ascetic who never stops talking about the day he met Baden Powell, a retiring guestmaster who is nervous of meeting people. And, of course, there’s Anselm ... a beekeeper who’s never got over the sting issue. Their topsy-turvy existence is one step removed from ordinary life, which gives this particular beekeeper a special vantage point onto the vexed world he left behind. And that brings me to The Discourtesy of Death, Anselm’s first outing with The Overlook Press, for it deals with the vexing question of mercy killing.

Jennifer Henderson was one of those people who knew the meaning of misfortune. A former dancer, she returned to the stage only to fall and break her neck. Paralysed from the chest down and bedridden, she grappled with depression until bowel cancer brought her life to a quick and merciful end. Or at least that’s what everyone believes. The truth could be rather different, because two years after her death, Anselm receives an anonymous letter accusing Peter Henderson, her husband, of her callous murder. So Anselm is drawn into very deep water indeed: was Jenny in fact murdered or was she helped to die? And if she was helped, had she been persuaded or forced to end her life ... because, frankly, it was considered best for everyone involved? Except, perhaps, for Jenny herself. And even then, what was left of Jenny’s life? Was it even worth holding onto, set against the difference it would make to her family if she were to quietly slip away? Meanwhile, the clock is ticking, because unknown to Anselm, Jenny’s father isn’t especially troubled by ethics. He’s set out to execute his daughter’s presumed killer.

The Discourtesy of Death is about the tricky area of choice. It is about how our choices can be tightly woven into other people’s needs and desires ... how our freedom is rarely unencumbered. It’s also a mystery. And, I hope, an entertaining one.

CWA Dagger Award Longlists

The CWA (Crime Writers Association) 2016 Dagger Award Longlists were announced at Crimefest tonight.

CWA GOLDSBORO GOLD DAGGER
Dodgers, Bill Beverly, No Exit Press
Black Widow, Christopher Brookmyre, Little Brown
After You Die, Eve Dolan, Harvill Secker
Real Tigers, Mick Herron, John Murray
Finders Keepers, Stephen King, Hodder & Stoughton
Dead Pretty, David Mark, Mulholland books/Hodder & Stoughton
Blood Salt Water, Denise Mina, Orion
She Died Young, Elizabeth Wilson, Serpent’s Tail

CWA IAN FLEMING STEEL DAGGER 
The Cartel, Don Winslow, William Heinemann
The English Spy, Daniel Silva, HarperCollins
Bone by Bone, Sanjida Kay, Corvus
Rain Dogs, Adrian McKinty, Serpent’s Tail
Real Tigers, Mick Herron, John Murray
The Hot Countries, Timothy Hallinan, Soho Crime
Black Eyed Susans, Julia Hearberlin, Michael Joseph
Make Me, Lee Child, Bantam Press
Spy Games, Adam Brookes, Sphere
The American, Nadia Dalbuono, Scribe UK

CWA INTERNATIONAL DAGGER
Title,  Author,  Translated by,  Publisher

The Truth and Other Lies, Sascha Arango, Imogen Taylor, Simon & Schuster
The Great Swindle, Pierre Lemaître, Frank WynnE, Quercus/Maclehose
Icarus, Deon Meyer, K L Seegers, Hodder & Stoughton
The Sword of Justice, Leif G.W. Persson, Neil Smith, Doubleday
The Murderer in Ruins, Cay Rademacher, Peter Millar, Arcadia
The Father, Anton Svensson, Translation not credited, Sphere
The Voices Beyond, Johan Theorin, Marlaine Delargy, Transworld
Six Four, Hideo Yokoyama, Jonathan Lloyd-Davis, Quercus

CWA SHORT STORY DAGGER

As Alice Did, Andrea Camilleri Montalbano’s First Cases, Pan Macmillan
On the Anatomization of an Unknown Man (1637) by Frans Mier, John Connolly, Nocturnes 2: Night Music, Hodder and Stoughton
Holmes on the Range: A Tale of the Caxton Private Lending Library & Book Depository,  John Connolly, Nocturnes 2: Night Music, Hodder and Stoughton
Bryant & May and the Nameless Woman, Christopher Fowler, London’s Glory, Bantam
Stray Bullets, Alberto Barrera, Tyszka Crimes, MacLehose Press
Rosenlaui, Conrad Williams, The Mammoth Book of the Adventures of Moriarty: The Secret Life of Sherlock Holmes’s Nemesis edited by Maxim Jakubowski, Constable & Robinson

CWA NON FICTION DAGGER

The Golden Age of Murder, Martin Edwards, HarperCollins
Sexy Beasts: The Hatton Garden Mob, Wensley Clarkson, Quercus
You Could Do Something Amazing With Your Life (You Are Raoul Moat), Andrew Hankinson, Scribe
A Very Expensive Poison, Luke Harding, Faber
Jeremy Hutchinson’s Case Histories, Thomas Grant, John Murray
John le Carré, the biography, Adam Sisman, Bloomsbury

CWA DEBUT DAGGER
For 15 years the CWA has been encouraging new writing with its Debut Dagger competition for unpublished writers. The submissions are judged by a panel of top crime editors and agents, and the short listed entries are sent to publishers and agents.

Dark Valley John Kennedy
Death by Dangerous Oliver Jarvis
The Devil’s Dice Roz Watkins
Hardways Catherine Hendricks
Let’s Pretend Sue Williams
Misconception Jack Burns
A Reconstructed Man Graham Brack
A State of Grace Rita Catching
The Tattoo Killer Joe West
Wimmera Mark Brandi

CWA JOHN CREASEY (NEW BLOOD) DAGGER 

Fever City, Tim Baker, Faber&Faber
Dodgers, Bill Beverly, No Exit Press
Mr Miller, Charles Den, Tex World Editions
The Teacher, Katerina Diamond, Avon
Wicked Game, Matt Johnson, Orenda Books
Freedom’s Child, Jax Miller, HarperCollins
Eileen, Ottessa Moshfegh, Jonathan Cape
The Dark Inside, Rod Reynolds, Faber&Faber
The Good Liar, Nicholas Searle, Viking

CWA ENDEAVOR HISTORICAL DAGGER

The House at Baker Street Michelle Birkby Pan Books
A Death in the Dales Frances Brody Piatkus
A Man of Some Repute, A Question of Inheritance Elizabeth Edmondson Thomas & Mercer
Smoke and Mirrors Elly Griffiths Quercus
The Last Confessions of Thomas Hawkins Antonia Hodgson Hodder & Stoughton
The Other Side of Silence Philip Kerr Quercus
A Book of Scars William Shaw Quercus
The Jazz Files Fiona Veitch Smith Lion Fiction
Striking Murder A. J. Wright Allison & Busby
Stasi Child David Young Twenty7Books

DAGGER IN THE LIBRARY
Crime fans everywhere can nominate their favourite authors online and the ten authors with the most votes will make up the longlist. The response received last year was staggering, with 1,384 crime fans voting for 636 different authors, highlighting the extraordinary quality and variety in crime writing.
Unlike most other literary prizes, the Dagger in the Library is awarded not for an individual book but for an author’s entire body of work and is one of six highly prized CWA Dagger Awards awarded to crime writers since 1955.

RC Bridgestock
Tony Black 
Alison Bruce 
Angela Clarke 
Charlie Flowers 
Elly Griffiths 
Keith Houghton 
Quintin Jardine 
Louise Phillips 
Joe Stein 

More CWA Daggers: Gold, Creasey & Steel Shortlists

More awards were announced last night at the CWA Banquet. These are the shortlists from the Crime Writers' Association.

CWA GOLDSBORO GOLD DAGGER SHORTLIST 

The Shut Eye by Belinda Bauer (Transworld Publishers/Bantam Press)
The Rules of Wolfe by James Carlos Blake (Oldcastle Books/No Exit Press)
The Silkworm by Robert Galbraith (Little, Brown Book Group/Sphere)
Missing by Sam Hawken (Profile Books/Serpent's Tail)
Mr Mercedes  by Stephen King (Hodder & Stoughton/Hodder & Stoughton)
Pleasantville byAttica Locke (Profile Books/Serpent's Tail)
Life or Death by Michael Robotham (Little, Brown Book Group/Sphere)

CWA JOHN CREASEY (NEW BLOOD) DAGGER SHORTLIST 

The Abrupt Physics of Dying by Paul E Hardisty (Orenda Books)
Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng (Little, Brown Book Group)
Fourth of July Creek by Smith Henderson (Random House/William Heinemann)
The Girl in the Red Coat by Kate Hamer (Faber and Faber)
You  by Caroline Kepnes (Simon & Schuster)

CWA IAN FLEMING STEEL DAGGER SHORTLIST

Missing by Sam Hawken (Profile Books/Serpent's Tail)
The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins (Transworld Publishers/Doubleday)
Nobody Walks by Mick Herron (Soho Crime)
The White Van by Patrick Hoffman (Atlantic Books Ltd/Grove Press)
The Night The Rich Men Burned by Malcolm Mackay (Pan Macmillan/Mantle)
Cop Town by Karin Slaughter (Random House/Century)
The Kind Worth Killing by Peter Swanson (Faber and Faber)

HT: Karen Meek, Eurocrime