SCRIBE AWARD WINNERS 2020

Acknowledging excellence in the field of tie-in writing, the International Association of Media Tie-In Writers announced the winners of the 2020 Scribe Awards.  Congratulations to all winners! It was a very good year for Media Tie-in writing!

ADAPTED NOVEL--GENERAL & SPECULATIVE
Alita: Battle Angel by Pat Cadigan

AUDIO DRAMAS
Doctor Who – 10 Doctor Adventures – The Creeping Death by Roy Gill

GRAPHIC NOVEL
Blade Runner 2019: Los Angeles (Michael Green and Mike Johnson)

ORIGINAL NOVEL--GENERAL
The Bitterest Pill - Reed Farrel Coleman

ORIGINAL NOVEL SPECULATIVE
Tie:
Batman, The Court of Owls by Greg Cox
Star Trek TNG, Collateral Damage by David Mack

SHORT STORY
Tales of Basil and Meobis Fresh Hells: "Cutter & Razz" by Chris A. Jackson

YOUNG ADULT & MIDDLE GRADE
Warhammer Adventures: Attack of the Necron by Cavan Scott

STRAND CRITICS AWARDS 2020

The Strand Magazine announced its nominations for the 2020 Strand Critics Awards. The Awards recognize excellence in the field of mystery fiction and publishing. 

Best Mystery Novel:
— Big Sky, by Kate Atkinson (Little, Brown)
— The Lost Man, by Jane Harper (Flatiron)
— The Sentence Is Death, by Anthony Horowitz (Harper)
— Lady in the Lake, by Laura Lippman (Morrow)
— Heaven, My Home, by Attica Locke (Mulholland)
— The Border, by Don Winslow (Morrow)

Best Debut Novel:
— Scrublands, by Chris Hammer (Atria)
— Miracle Creek, by Angie Kim (Sarah Crichton)
— One Night Gone, by Tara Laskowski (Graydon House)
— The Silent Patient, by Alex Michaelides (Celadon)
— Three-Fifths, by John Vercher (Agora)

Bronwen Hruska of Soho Press is this year's recipient of the Publisher of the Year Award. 

Tess Gerritsen and Walter Mosley were awarded Lifetime Achievement. 

Winners will be announced at a virtual event September 4.

Cartoon of the Day: Dogs

MACAVITY AWARD NOMINEES 2020

The Macavity Award Nominees 2020
(for works published in 2019)

The Macavity Awards are nominated by members of Mystery Readers International, subscribers to Mystery Readers Journal, and friends of MRI. The winners will be announced at opening ceremonies at the Virtual Sacramento Bouchercon. Congratulations to all.

If you're a member of MRI, a subscriber to MRJ, or a friend of MRI, you will receive a ballot by August 1, so get reading.

Best Mystery Novel 
Your House Will Pay by Steph Cha (Ecco)
This Tender Land by William Kent Krueger (Atria)
Lady in the Lake by Laura Lippman (Wm. Morrow)
The Chain by Adrian McKinty (Mulholland)
The Murder List by Hank Philippi Ryan (Forge)
Sarah Jane by James Sallis (Soho Crime)

Best First Mystery 
The Ninja Daughter by Tori Eldridge (Agora Books)
My Lovely Wife by Samantha Downing (Penguin)
Miracle Creek by Angie Kim (Sarah Crichton Books)
One Night Gone by Tara Laskowski (Graydon House)
Call Me Evie by J.P. Pomare (G.P. Putnam's Sons)
American Spy by Lauren Wilkinson (Random House)

Best Mystery Short Story 
“West Texas Barbecue” by Michael Chandos (The Eyes of Texas, edited by Michael Bracken—Down & Out Books)
“Alex's Choice” by Barb Goffman (Crime Travel, edited by Barb Goffman—Wildside Press)
“The Cardboard Box” by Terence Faherty (Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, Jan/Feb 2019)
"Whiteout” by G.M. Malliet (EQMM, Jan/Feb 2019)
“Brother’s Keeper” by Dave Zeltserman (EQMM, May/June 2019)
“Better Days,” by Art Taylor (EQMM, May/June 2019)

Best Mystery Nonfiction/Critical
Hitchcock and the Censors by John Billheimer (University Press of Kentucky)
Frederic Dannay, Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine and the Art of the Detective Short Story by Laird R. Blackwell (McFarland)
Beyond the Thirty-Nine Steps: A Life of John Buchan by Ursula Buchan (Bloomsbury)
Norco '80: The True Story of the Most Spectacular Bank Robbery in American History by Peter Houlahan (Counterpoint)
The Mutual Admiration Society: How Dorothy L. Sayers and Her Oxford Circle Remade the World for Women, by Mo Moulton (Basic Books)
Indecent Advances: A Hidden History of True Crime and Prejudice Before Stonewall by James Polchin (Counterpoint Press)

Sue Feder Memorial Award for Best Historical Mystery
Murder Knocks Twice by Susanna Calkins (Minotaur)
The Pearl Dagger by L.A. Chandlar (Kensington)
A Lady’s Guide to Gossip and Murder by Dianne Freeman (Kensington)
Satapur Moonstone by Sujata Massey (Soho Crime)
Charity’s Burden by Edith Maxwell (Midnight Ink)
The Secrets We Kept by Lara Prescott (Vintage)

RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES!: Guest Post by Harold Schechter

HAROLD SCHECHTER:
RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES!

In recent years, beginning a movie with a “Based on True Events” title card has become standard procedure. Things were different in the old days. Though many films from the past were inspired by true crimes, screenwriters generally didn’t advertise that fact. My book Ripped From the Headlines!: The Shocking True Stories Behind the Movies’ Most Memorable Crimes explores the real-life cases behind more than three dozen fictional films, from classics like Billy Wilder’s Double Indemnity and Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope to cult films like and Wes Craven’s The Hills Have Eyes and Tobe Hooper’s Eaten Alive.

The latter movie--a gleefully sadistic follow-up to Hooper’s 1974 masterpiece, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre--involves the demented proprietor of a sleazy swampland hotel who enjoys feeding his guests and other hapless victims to his pet crocodile. Though the premise of this Grade-Z gorefest might seem to have sprung entirely from warped imagination of its creator, it was actually based on the on legendary crimes of a real-life serial killer named was Joe Ball.

A skirt-chasing reprobate, Ball made his early money as a bootlegger in the 1920s. With the repeal of Prohibition, he opened a rowdy, roadside joint called the Sociable Inn outside San Antonio, Texas. It’s main draw, besides the cheap booze, was a large cement pond out back that he stocked with full-grown alligators, whose frenzied nightly feedings became a local attraction, particularly when he tossed in a live kitten or pup.

Besides the reptile shows, Ball’s place was known for its unusually high turnover of waitresses. Investigating stories about two of these disappearances, lawmen learned that the women had come to violent ends at Joe’s hands. When they showed up at his tavern to arrest him, Joe pulled a pistol from his cash register and put a fatal bullet in his chest.

Within days, newspapers were referring to him as “the Bluebeard of South Texas,” responsible for the murders of “at least half-dozen women.” What earned Ball his lasting notoriety, however, wasn’t the number of his presumed victims but the horrifying method by which he had ostensibly disposed of some of them. According to one witness cited by authorities, Ball had “chopped up the bodies of his victims and fed them to his pet alligators.”

The story became a newspaper sensation throughout the Southwest. “FED VICTIMS TO ALLIGATORS,” the headlines screamed. “ALLIGATORS FED ON HUMAN FLESH ON MURDER FARM,” “SLAIN WOMEN FED TO ‘GATORS!” Those who bothered to read the accompanying articles learned that “there was no way to ascertain the truth of this story,” which was universally dismissed by Ball’s acquaintances. Joe may have killed a few women, his ex-wife told reporters, but “he wasn’t no horrible monster.” Still, the legend of “Alligator Joe” lived on in pulp magazines, true crime books, and horror films: further confirmation of the famous line in John Ford’s The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance: “When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.”


Harold Schechter is an American true-crime writer who specializes in serial killers. Twice nominated for the Edgar Award, he is the author of the nonfiction books Fatal, Fiend, Bestial, Deviant, Deranged, Depraved, The Serial Killer Files, The Mad Sculptor, Man-Eater, Hell’s Princess: The Mystery of Belle Gunness, Butcher of Men, and Bloodlands: The Dark Heart of Our History. A professor emeritus at Queens College of the City University of New York, Schechter is married to poet Kimiko Hahn.

MYSTERIES SET IN FRANCE: Bastille Day!

Celebrate Bastille Day with a copy of  Mystery Readers Journal: Mysteries Set in France (Volume 28:1)! Buy this back issue! Available in hardcopy or as a downloadable PDF.

MYSTERIES SET IN FRANCE: MYSTERY READERS JOURNAL

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ARTICLES

• A Brief Panorama of Early French Crime Fiction by Jean-Marc Lofficier
• Sex and the Country: Some Thoughts on Pierre Magnan by Peter Rozovsky
• An Interview with Sîan Reynolds by Peter Rozovsky
• My Affair With the Birthplace of Crime Fiction by Bernadette Bean
• Tale of Two Dominiques by Cary Watson
• The Father of the Detective Story: Emile Gaboriau by Nina Cooper

AUTHOR! AUTHOR!

• Passion, Bloodshed, Desire, and Death by Susanne Alleyn
• How I Got Into My Life of Crime French Style by Cara Black
• Honest! I Was in Paris Working Very Hard! by Rick Blechta
• Having a Nice Time? by Rhys Bowen
• Inspector Aliette Nouvelle by John Brooke
• The French Adventure of a Full-time Lawyer and Part-time Fool by Alan Gordon
• Escape From Paris by Carolyn Hart
• Maggie MacGowen Goes to France by Wendy Hornsby
• France on Berlin Time by J. Robert Janes
• Experiencing Provence by M.L. Longworth
• Writing a French Police Series by Adrian Magson
• France, the Write Country by Peter May
• Travel + Fiction: You Want to Go There by Lise McClendon
• Hemingway's Paris Remains 'A Moveable Feast' by Craig McDonald
• Inspired by the "Where" by Tom Mitcheltree
• It's All About Me? by Sharan Newman
• Drinking Tea From a Bowl: Getting France Right by D-L Nelson
• Mysteries Set in France: Vive la Différence! by Katherine Hall Page
• Provence—To Die For by Renée Paley-Bain
• Mick Jagger, Kirs Royales, and Paris by P.J. Parrish
• Paris Shadows by M.J. Rose
• Diplomatic Mystery by William S. Shepard
• Alpine Beach: My French Connection by Susan Steggall
• She Lost Her Head in La Belle France by Nancy Means Wright

COLUMNS

• Crossword: The French Connection by Verna Suit
• Mystery in Retrospect: Reviews by Lesa Holstine, L.J. Roberts, Alana White, Marlyn Beebe
• Children's Hour: Where's Madeleine? by Gay Toltl Kinman
• In Short: Glimpses of France by Marvin Lachman
• The Art of French Crime by Cathy Pickens
• Crime Seen: Le Crime Vu by Kate Derie
• Mysteries Set in France by British Authors by Philip Scowcroft
• From the Editor's Desk by Janet A. Rudolph