2023 ITW Thriller Award nominations

 

Best Hardcover Novel

The Violence by Delilah S. Dawson (Del Rey)

Things We Do in The Dark by Jennifer Hillier (Minotaur)

The Fervor by Alma Katsu (Penguin/Putnam)

The Children on the Hill by Jennifer McMahon (Simon & Schuster)

Two Nights in Lisbon by Chris Pavone (MCD)

Sundial by Catriona Ward (Macmillan)

Best Audiobook

Young Rich Widows by Kimberly Belle, Fargo Layne, Cate Holahan, Vanessa Lillie (Audible) Narrated by Dina Pearlman, Karissa Vacker, Helen Laser, Ariel Blake

The Lies I Tell by Julie Clark (Audible) Narrated by Anna Caputo, Amanda Dolan

The Photo Thief by J. L. Delozier (CamCat Publishing) Narrated by Rachel L. Jacobs, Jeffrey Kafer

Things We Do in The Dark by Jennifer Hillier (Macmillan Audio) Narrated by Carla Vega

The Silent Woman by Minka Kent (Blackstone Publishing) Narrated by Christine Lakin, Kate Rudd

Best First Novel

The Resemblance by Lauren Nossett (Flatiron Books)

Blood Sugar by Sascha Rothchild (Penguin/Putnam)

Dirt Town by Hayley Scrivenor (Dirt Creek)

A Flicker in the Dark by Stacy Willingham (Minotaur)

The Fields by Erin Young (Flatiron Books)

Best Paperback Original Novel

The Lies I Told by Mary Burton (Montlake Romance)

No Place to Run by Mark Edwards (Thomas & Mercer)

Unmissing by Minka Kent (Thomas & Mercer)

The Housemaid by Freida McFadden (Grand Central Publishing)

Anywhere You Run by Wanda Morris (William Morrow)

The Couple Upstairs by Holly Wainwright (Pan Macmillan)

The Patient's Secret by Loreth Anne White –(Montlake Romance)

Best Short Story

Russian for Beginners by Dominique Bibeau (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine)

The Gift by Barb Goffman (Down & Out Books)

Publish or Perish by Smita Harish Jain (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine)

33 Clues into the Disappearnce of My Sister by Joyce Carol Oates (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine)

Schrödinger, Cat by Anna Scotti (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine)

Stockholm by Catherine Steadman (Amazon Original Stories)

Best Young Adult Novel

Our Crooked Hears by Melissa Albert (Flatiron Books)

Sugaring Off by Gillian French (Algonquin Young Readers)

Daughter by Kate McLaughlin (Wednesday Books)

What's Coming to Me by Francesca Padilla (Soho Teen)

I'm the Girl by Courtney Summers (Wednesday Books)

Best E-Book original

Evasive Species by Bill Byrnes (Self-published)

The Couple at Causeway Cottage by Diane Jeffrey (HarperCollins)

The Seven Truths of Hannah Baxter by Grant McKenzie (Self-published)

The Hollow Place by Rick Mofina (Self-published)

Fatal Rounds by Carrie Rubin (Self-published)

ITW will announce the winners at ThrillerFest XVIII on Saturday 3 June 2023 at the Sheraton New York Times Square Hotel, New York City.

Congratulations to all the finalists!

The Hollows by Mark Edwards (review)

Publisher: Thomas & Mercer

Release Date: 8^th July 2021

Format: Paperback [also available in eBook]

Price: £8.99

Reviewed by Amy Myers

Are you brave enough to visit Hollow Falls? Best-selling author Mark Edwards’ website throws out this challenge to his readers. I’m very glad I did visit it, although the characters in this thrilling new novel would certainly have chosen otherwise, given the chance. From his first psychological thriller in 2013, The Magpies, even the titles of Mark Edwards’ novels lay the ground for the creepiness and menace that lie ahead for the reader. The Hollows is no exception.

The author excels at creating and building up the scary horrors that affect ordinary people. When Tom Anderson comes over to the US from England to pick up his 14-year-old daughter Frankie from the home of his former wife for a 10-day vacation in a splendid New England resort nothing seems unusual about it. It seems to be meeting all their requirements, especially when they meet David and Connie Butler in the neighbouring cabin. Their 15-year-old son Ryan makes a good companion for Frankie. There is no internet connection, but why worry about that?

But then David learns a little more about Hollow Falls and the shadows that lie over it. Some years earlier a naked man and woman engaged in extra-marital sex had been found murdered, lying across a huge stone marked with pagan symbols.  No one has been charged with their murder because the chief suspect, Everett Miller, has disappeared. He is thought to be living in the thick woodland that divides Hollow Falls from the small town of Penance. Other than that murder, though, everything and everyone seems normal – even if the teenagers of Penance seem hostile to the newcomers. Normal? Far from it.

Mark Edwards controls the pace brilliantly. It builds and builds, seemingly slowly but never losing its grip on the reader. This is a thriller that truly thrills. Give yourself a holiday and read The Hollows – if you’re brave enough.

The Dead Good Reader Awards 2019 – winners

On Friday 19 July 2019, crime and thriller lovers came together at the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival in Harrogate to celebrate their favourite books and authors at the fifth annual Dead Good Reader Awards.

Here are the six authors you voted best in class!

The Nosy Parker Award for Best Amateur Detective:

The Suspect by Fiona Barton

The Jury’s Out Award for Most Gripping Courtroom Drama:

Thirteen by Steve Cavanagh

The Dish Served Cold Award for Best Revenge Thriller:

My Lovely Wife by Samantha Downing

The Cancel All Plans Award for the Book You Can’t Put Down:

Skin Deep by Liz Nugent

The Cat and Mouse Award for Most Elusive Villain:

Last of the Magpies by Mark Edwards

The Dead Good Recommends Award for Most Recommended Book:

The Stone Circle by Elly Griffiths

Congratulations to all the winning authorsand those shortlisted for the Dead Good Reader Awards 2019!

Books To Look Forward To From Harper Collins

Terrifyingly authentic, London-set debut crime novel with a psychological edge, by an ex-Met detective.  DI Sean Corrigan is not like other detectives.  The terrible abuse he suffered in childhood has not stopped him enjoying family life with his wife and two daughters, or pursuing an impressive career with South London's Murder Investigation Unit.  Nevertheless, it has left him with an uncanny ability to identify the darkness in others - a darkness he recognises still exists deep within his own psyche and battles to keep buried there.  Now Sean's on the trail of the most dangerous killer he has ever encountered.  The perpetrator has no recognisable MO, leaves no forensic evidence and his victims have nothing in common.  But Sean knows they were all murdered by the same man.  Now all he has to do is find the evidence, convince his bosses and stop the killing ...before his adversary gets too close to home.  Cold Killing is by Luke Delaney and is due to be published in March 2013.

Professor Morley's guide to Norfolk is a story of bygone England; quaint villages, eccentric locals - and murder!  It is 1937 and disillusioned Spanish Civil War veteran Stephen Sefton is stony broke.  So when he sees a mysterious advertisement for a job where 'intelligence is essential', he applies.  Thus begins Sefton's association with Professor Swanton Morley, an omnivorous intellect.  Morley's latest project is a history of traditional England, with a guide to every county.  They start in Norfolk, but when the vicar of Blakeney is found hanging from his church's bell rope, Morley and Sefton find themselves drawn into a rather more fiendish plot.  Did the Reverend really take his own life, or was it - murder?  Beginning a thrilling new detective series, 'The Norfolk Mystery' is the first of The County Guides by Ian Sansom and is due to be published in June 2013.

Touch is by Mark Sennen and is due to be published in April 2013.  Harry likes pretty things.  He likes to look at them.  Sometimes that is not enough.  He wants to get closer.  Naughty Harry.  DI Savage and her team in Plymouth are struggling with their investigation into a string of horrific attacks on young women.  The victims are being drugged, abducted, assaulted and then abandoned with only a dull memory of what has happened.  However, when the mutilated body of one of these women is found on a beach, the case becomes a chilling murder inquiry.  Stopping at just one victim will never be enough ...not for this killer.  Part thriller, part police procedural, Touch will take you deep into the madness of a serial killer's mind.

The Lost Boy is the seventh book in the Patrik Hedstrom and Erika Falck series by Camilla Lackberg and is due to be published in March 2013.  On a late summer's night, a young woman jumps in her car, her hands slippery with blood on the steering wheel.  Taking her five-year-old son, Nathalie flees to the only safe haven she knows: the island of Graskar off the coast of Fjallbacka...Meanwhile, Detective Patrik Hedstrom has barely stepped foot inside his office following a lengthy sick leave before he catches a murder investigation.  A man has been murdered in his home: the victim, Mats Sverin, was the council's financial director, heading up a regeneration project worth millions.  But when Patrik and his team start digging into the dead man's life, all they can uncover is unanswered questions.  Why was Mats in such a rush to return to his home town of Fjallbacka after years in Gothenburg?  And is it pure coincidence that Mats's childhood sweetheart Nathalie has also suddenly returned to the area?  Mats visited Nathalie on Graskar before his death.  The locals call the island 'The Ghost Isle' - they say that it is haunted, and that the dead have something to tell the living.  But will anyone get close enough to uncover the dark secrets that lurk there?

He's posted on your wall.  He's following you on Twitter.  He knows where you are right now...When Amy receives an email from her older sister, Becky, announcing that she's off travelling and "don't try to find me", she is worried.  Becky would never do such a thing on a whim.  Amy - who is recovering from an abusive relationship that has left her terrified of love - soon finds that Becky had started using online dating sites.  Aided by Becky's neighbour, Gary, Amy sets about tracking down the men her sister had dated, following a trail that leads her into the darkly seductive world of internet hook-ups.  But Amy is unaware that a sadistic killer is watching - a killer who's been using the internet to stalk, torture and kill.  Now he's got something very special planned for Amy and she is about to find out that romance really is dead.  Slash Forward is by Louise Voss and Mark Edwards and is due to be published in July 2013.

As teenagers, Maggie Donaldson and Johnny Taylor fell hard and fast in love.  But they did not know they were from rival gangland families in London's criminal underworld.  Going public with their relationship would have brought them more trouble than they could handle, so for years they concealed the truth.  But their house of cards will not be safe for much longer.  Maggie's violent father Max has always been out for the Taylors' blood and treats his own family with barely more sympathy.  There is a long-buried reason for the vendetta that no one talks about, a secret so shocking it could tear each family - and Maggie and Johnny - apart...  Trapped is a gritty story of bitter feuds and unbreakable bonds by Jacqui Rose and is due to be published in March 2013.