2020 CWA Daggers - Shortlists Announced

The 2020 shortlists for the prestigious CWA Dagger awards, which honour the very best in the crime writing genre, have been announced.

The world-famous Crime Writers’ Association (CWA) Daggers are the oldest awards in the genre and have been synonymous with quality crime writing for over half a century.

Mick Herron’s Joe Country, Claire Askew’s What You Pay For and Lou Berney’s November Road are all in contention for the CWA Gold Dagger, awarded to the best crime novel. November Road is also on the shortlist for the Ian Fleming Steel Dagger for the best thriller, up against One Way Out by AA Dhand, Between Two Evils by Eva Dolan and the Richard and Judy pick The Whisper Man by Alex North.

Linda Stratmann, Chair of the Crime Writers’ Association, said: “As the CWA Daggers are unmatched for their reputation and longevity, these shortlists offer a showcase of the finest writing in crime fiction and non-fiction. They reveal the remarkable variety and huge relevance of the genre, which continues to dominate book sales and to shape our cultural landscape.”

The much-anticipated John Creasey (New Blood) Dagger highlights the best debut novels. Among the six shortlisted debuts are Little White Lies by Philippa East, acclaimed as ‘unputdownable’, and Trevor Wood, who served in the Royal Navy for 16 years, makes the list with The Man on the Street, featuring a homeless veteran grappling with PTSD, dubbed by Lee Child as ‘an instant classic’.

Abir Mukherjee’s Death in the East is not only shortlisted for the Gold Dagger but also the Sapere Books Historical Dagger. He contends with Metropolis, completed just before Philip Kerr’s untimely death and SG Maclean, who won the Dagger last year for Destroying Angel; she returns with The Bear Pit.

The Crime Fiction in Translation Dagger shortlist features Finland’s acclaimed and award-winning writer, Antti Tuomainen, with Little Siberia translated by David Hackston. The king of Helsinki noir is up against Marion Brunet, the winner of the prestigious Grand Prix de Littérature policière in 2018, whose novel Summer of Reckoning is translated by Katherine Gregor.

The CWA Daggers are one of the few high-profile awards that honour the short story.

Syd Moore, who was shortlisted in the category in 2019, returns with her short story “Easily Made” in 12 Strange Days of Christmas. Paul Finch, a former cop and journalist turned bestselling crime writer, sees his short story “The New Lad” (published in the anthology Exit Wounds) make the shortlist. They are up against established authors including Christopher Fowler, author of over fifty novels and short-story collections, and the blockbuster American mystery writer Jeffery Deaver, who won the Short Story Dagger in 2004.

The shortlist for the ALCS Gold Dagger for Non-Fiction includes Casey Cep, a staff writer at the New York Times whose first book Furious Hours: Murder, Fraud and the Last Trial of Harper Lee, has received acclaim on both sides of the Atlantic. Also on the shortlist is Caroline Goode for Honour: Achieving Justice for Banaz Mahmod. It’s the heart-breaking true story of Banaz Mahmod, the young Londoner murdered by her own family for falling in love with the wrong man, adapted for TV starring Keeley Hawes as Detective Chief Inspector Caroline Goode.

The Dagger in the Library is voted on exclusively by librarians, chosen for the author’s body of work and support of libraries. This year’s shortlisted nominees are Christopher Brookmyre, Jane Casey, Alex Gray and Quintin Jardine.

One of the anticipated highlights of the awards is the Debut Dagger competition, open to unknown and uncontracted writers. Settings for the shortlisted novels are varied and range from modern-day America, rural Australia, an organic farm near Bern, 2011 Cuba, a contemporary offshore oil platform and sixteenth century Orkney.

This year also features the Best Crime and Mystery Publisher of the Year Dagger, launched in 2019, which celebrates publishers and imprints demonstrating excellence and diversity in crime writing.

The winners of the 2020 Daggers will be announced at an awards ceremony, due to take place on 22 October.

The Shortlists in Full:

GOLD DAGGER

What You Pay For by Claire Askew (Hodder & Stoughton)

November Road by Lou Berney(Harper Fiction)

Forced Confessions by John Fairfax (Little, Brown)

Joe Country by Mick Herron (John Murray)

Death in the East by Abir Mukherjee (Harvill Secker)

Good Girl, Bad Girl by Michael Robotham (Sphere)

IAN FLEMING STEEL DAGGER

November Road by Lou Berney (Harper Fiction)

This is Gomorrah by Tom Chatfield (Hodder & Stoughton)

One Way Out by AA Dhand (Bantam Press)

Between Two Evils by Eva Dolan (Raven Books)

Cold Storage by David Koepp(HQ)

The Whisper Man by Alex North:(Michael Joseph)

JOHN CREASEY (NEW BLOOD) DAGGER

Your House Will Pay by Steph Cha (Faber & Faber)

My Lovely Wife by Samantha Downing (Michael Joseph)

Little White Lies by Philippa East (HQ)

The Wreckage by Robin Morgan-Bentley (Trapeze)

The Man on the Street by Trevor Wood(Quercus Fiction)

SAPERE BOOKS HISTORICAL DAGGER

In Two Minds by Alis Hawkins (The Dome Press)

Metropolis by Philip Kerr(Quercus Fiction)

The Bear Pit by SG MacLean (Quercus Fiction)

Death in the East by Abir Mukherjee (Harvill Secker)

The Anarchists’ Club by Alex Reeve (Raven Books)

The Paper Bark Tree Mystery by Ovidia Yu (Constable)

CRIME FICTION IN TRANSLATION DAGGER

Summer of Reckoning by Marion Brunet, translated by Katherine Gregor (Bitter Lemon Press)

The Godmother by Hannelore Cayre, translated by Stephanie Smee (Old Street Publishing)

Like Flies from Afar by K Ferrari, translated by Adrian Nathan West (Canongate Books)

November by Jorge Galán, translated by Jason Wilson (Constable)

The Fragility of Bodies by Sergio Olguín, translated by Miranda France (Bitter Lemon Press)

Little Siberia by Antti Tuomainen, translated by David Hackston (Orenda Books)

SHORT STORY DAGGER

The Bully by Jeffery Deaver in Exit Wounds, edited by Paul B Kane and Marie O’Regan (Titan Books)

The New Lad by Paul Finch in Exit Wounds, edited by Paul B Kane and Marie O’Regan (Titan Books)

The Washing by Christopher Fowler in Invisible Blood, edited by Maxim Jakubowski (Titan Books)

#Me Too by Lauren Henderson in Invisible Blood, edited by Maxim Jakubowski (Titan Books)

The Recipe by Louise Jensen in Exit Wounds, edited by Paul B Kane and Marie O’Regan (Titan Books)

Easily Made by Syd Moore in 12 Strange Days of Christmas (Point Blank Press)

ALCS GOLD DAGGER FOR NON-FICTION

Furious Hours by Casey Cep (William Heinemann)

Corrupt Bodies by Peter Everett (Icon Books)

Honour: Achieving Justice for Banaz Mahmod by Caroline Goode (Oneworld Publications)

The Fatal Passion of Alma Rattenbury by Sean O’Connor (Simon & Schuster)

The Professor and the Parson: A Story of Desire, Deceit and Defrocking by Adam Sisman (Profile Books)

The Adventures of Maud West, Lady Detective by Susannah Stapleton (Picador)

DAGGER IN THE LIBRARY

Christopher Brookmyre

Jane Casey

Alex Gray

Quintin Jardine

DEBUT DAGGER

The Spae-Wife by Anna Caig

Whipstick by Leanne Fry

Pesticide by Kim Hays

Emergency Drill by Nicholas Morrish

Revolution Never Lies by Josephine Moulds

Bitter Lake by Michael Munro

PUBLISHERS’ DAGGER

Bitter Lemon Press

Harvill Secker

Head of Zeus

HQ

Michael Joseph

Orenda

Raven Books

Severn House

Books to Look Forward to from Hodder & Stoughton and Mulholland

July 2019

If you know what you're doing, you can find anything on the internet. Drugs, guns, porn, ideologies, elections, even lives and deaths are all up for sale . . . and everything must go. Elite hacker Azi Bello lives his life in the technological underbelly of the 21st century. A loner, charmer, and lover of grey areas, he works for himself and answers to no one - until his online existence crashes violently into the real world.   The secretive but intriguing Munira has reached out to Azi for help, and her story has sparked his interest: Munira's cousin has been recruited by terrorists and, in her attempts to find out more, she has attracted the attention of some very dangerous people.   Now forced to go on the run, Azi and Munira are drawn into a conspiracy, at the heart of which is Gomorrah: an exclusive online marketplace where anything can be acquired, and where the world's worst individuals lurk. As he throws himself into uncovering Gomorrah's dark secrets, it isn't long before Azi realises that the stakes are high and the risks even higher when you're no longer behind a screen.  The gates of Gomorrah have been opened.  All hell is about to break loose.  This is Gomorrah is by Tom Chatfield.

Short Range is by Stephen Leather.  Dan 'Spider' Shepherd's career path - soldier, policeman, MI5 officer - has always put a strain on his family. So he is far from happy to learn that MI5 is using teenagers as informants. Parents are being kept in the dark and Shepherd fears that the children are being exploited.  As an undercover specialist, Shepherd is tasked with protecting a 15-year-old schoolboy who is being used to gather evidence against violent drug dealers and a right-wing terrorist group. But when the boy's life is threatened, Shepherd has no choice but to step in and take the heat.  And while Shepherd's problems mount up at work, he has even greater problems closer to home. His son Liam has fallen foul of the Serbian Mafia and if Shepherd doesn't intervene, Liam will die.

For seven years, Sasza Zaluska has lived with her little girl in the north of England. Far from her previous job as an undercover cop, far from her dependence on alcohol and the traumatic case that made her flee from the police, her family and her native Poland. But now she is coming back.  This time, Sasza is looking for a quieter life. She has studied to become a psychological profiler and she soon picks up a freelance job to check out some threats made against the owner of a nightclub. But no sooner has Sasza visited the club than a man is murdered there and Sasza finds herself drawn back towards the world she left behind.  The dead man is a musician - famous for one song in particular: Girl at Midnight. Both the song and the crime seem to be connected to a double tragedy of years before, when a brother and sister both died on the same day.  Now Sasza Zaluska must follow a crooked, complex trail from a violent past to a more sophisticated criminal present, in which the gangsters have corrupted every level of society.  Girl at Midnight is by Katarzyna Bonda.

The Bone Fire is by S D Sykes.  1361. Plague has returned to England - thirteen years after the devastation of The Black Death. As destruction advances towards his estate in Kent, Oswald de Lacy leads his family to the safety of a remote castle in the marshes - where his friend Godfrey is preparing a fortress to survive the coming disaster.  The rules are clear: once the de Lacys and other guests are inside the castle the portcullis will be lowered and no-one permitted to enter or leave until the Pestilence has passed.  And then a murderer strikes.  Oswald is confronted with a stark choice - leave and face the ravages of the plague, or stay and place his family at the mercy of a brutal killer. With word of his skills as an investigator preceding him, it falls to Oswald to unmask the murderer in their midst. Host, guest, or servant - everyone is a suspect in this poisoned refuge of secrets, deceit and malice.

Girls Like Us is by Cristina Alger.  FBI Agent Nell Flynn is about to work the most personal case of her life.  Back home for the first time in a decade, Nell is getting ready to close the family estate after her father's death.  But there's one piece of unfinished business. Her father, a homicide detective, was investigating the murders of two young women. Now his partner has asked for Nell's help.  Nell soon realises that her father should be the prime suspect, and that his friends on the force are covering for him.  With no idea who she can trust, Nell also starts to question events that took place when she was a child. Could it be that the answers she so desperately needs are buried deep within her own memory?

August 2019

Outfox is by Sandra Bown. One man with multiple identities. Eight women who vanished without a trace.  The next likely victim...his wife   FBI agent Drex Easton is relentlessly driven by a single goal: to outmanoeuvre the conman once known as Weston Graham. Over the past thirty years, Weston has assumed many names and countless disguises, enabling him to lure eight wealthy women out of their fortunes before they disappeared without a trace. The only common trait among the victims: a new man in their life who also vanished, leaving behind no evidence of his existence.  Drex is convinced that these women have been murdered, and that the man he knows as Weston Graham is the sociopath responsible. But each time Drex gets close to catching him, Weston trades one persona for another and disappears again. Now, for the first time in their long game of cat and mouse, Drex has a suspect in sight.  Attractive and charming, Jasper Ford is recently married to a successful businesswoman many years his junior, Talia Shafer. Drex insinuates himself into their lives, posing as a new neighbour and setting up surveillance on their house. The closer he gets to the couple, the more convinced he becomes that Jasper is the clever, merciless predator he's sought-and that his own attraction to Talia threatens to compromise his purpose and integrity.   This is Drex's one chance to outfox his cunning nemesis before he murders again and eludes justice forever. But first he must determine if the desirable Talia is a heartless accomplice . . . or the next victim.

DI Birch joined the police to find her little brother, who walked out of his life one day and was never seen again. She stayed to help others, determined to seek justice where she could.  On the fourteenth anniversary of Charlie's disappearance, Birch takes part in a raid on one of Scotland's most feared criminal organisations. It's a good day's work - a chance to get a dangerous man off the streets. Two days later, Charlie comes back. It's not a coincidence. When Birch finds out exactly what he's been doing all those years, she faces a terrible choice: save the case, or save her brother. But how can you do the right thing when all the consequences are bad?   As she interrogates Charlie, he tells his story: of how one wrong turn leads to a world in which the normal rules no longer apply, and you do what you must to survive.  What You Pay For is by Claire Askew. 

The Art of Dying is by Douglas Lindsay.  When businessman Thomas Peterson is killed outside a football ground in the Highlands, there are several witnesses. Yet the hunt for the killer is proving as futile as the search for a motive.  Possible connections to Russian money and an eerie retirement home are soon thrown into the mix. To further complicate things, DI Westphall's MI6 past is coming back to haunt him. Guilt stalks his dreams, but could there be a message in these nightmares? Westphall is in danger of losing his head just when he needs it the most. He must find answers, and fast, before the murderer strikes again.

A series of gruesome killings take place in Dubai, Ghana and America. The victims are all connected with the SAS. In Hereford Danny Black realises they have something more specific in common - they were all involved in training a young Muslim soldier, Ibrahim Khan.  Khan has been working under cover in Islamic State in a mission organised by MI6. Danny Black sets out to track him down with the help of Khan's MI6 handler on a trail that leads him to a library of ancient manuscripts in Damascus, the Syrian desert and finally back in the Brecon Beacons. There Danny discovers that he has finally met his match, his deadliest enemy - and it is the last person he ever expected.  Black Ops is by Chris Ryan.

Bad Day at The Vulture Club is by Vaseem Khan. In the gripping new Baby Ganesh Agency novel, Inspector Chopra and his elephant sidekick investigate the death of one of Mumbai's wealthiest citizens, a murder with ramifications for its poorest.  The Parsees are among the oldest, most secretive and most influential communities in the city: respected, envied and sometimes feared.  When prominent industrialist Cyrus Zorabian is murdered on holy ground, his body dumped inside a Tower of Silence - where the Parsee dead are consumed by vultures - the police dismiss it as a random killing. But his daughter is unconvinced. Chopra, uneasy at entering this world of power and privilege, is soon plagued by doubts about the case.  But murder is murder. And in Mumbai, wealth and corruption go in hand in hand, inextricably linking the lives of both high and low...

The shot is impossible.  In the middle of a blizzard, down a busy New York avenue, into a moving car. And there's nothing worse than hunting a killer with a rifle in a city of windows. The agent in charge knows only one man with the skills to work out where the bullet came from. Lucas Page, physics professor and maths prodigy, quit the FBI after it nearly cost him his life. But he can't resist the call to help, to prove that he is still capable of extraordinary things. Because Page is wired to see crime from a different angle. The science that explains the impossible shot. The geometry that reveals the killer's location. The logic that tells him this shooter has killed like this before. And will do it again, and again, until they are stopped... City of Windows is by Robert Pobi.

September 2019

Missing-linc.com comprises a group of misfit sleuths scattered across the States. Their macabre passion is giving names to the unidentified dead. When Ellie Caine starts investigating the corpse known as the Boy in the Dress, the Boy's killer decides to join the group. The closer they get to the truth, the closer he will get to them. The Boy was Teddy Ryan. He was meant to have been killed in a car crash in the west of Ireland in 1989. Only he wasn't. There is no grave in Galway and Teddy was writing letters from New York a year after he supposedly died. But one night he met a man in a Minnesota bar and vanished off the face of the earth.  Teddy's nephew, Shaun, is no hero, but he is determined to solve the thirty-year-old mystery. He joins forces with the disparate members of Missing-linc to hunt down the killer. The only problem: the killer will be with them every step of the way . . .  Missing Person is by Sarah Lotz.

Sam is doing well in her career, she has a husband and a baby and life is going well. That is until she gets the note through her door that stops her heart in her chest. Never Have I Ever Been Punished For What I Have Done.  Sam is catapulted back to those teenage years spent with her best friends, teasing out each other's secrets by announcing things they had Never, ever done. Pushing each other's boundaries, growing closer and growing up.   If only they had stopped there. But they added their own rules. They went from sharing secrets to sharing firsts. First kisses, first drinks, first fake IDs. And that was before it all went spiralling out of control. Before that day in the woods ended it all.  Because no matter how far it goes, you have to obey the rules of the game. Even if what you've never done should stay that way. And now Sam is about to discover that the game isn't over.  Never Have I Ever is by Lucy Hay.

She Lies in Vines is by Benjamin Stevenson.  Four years ago Eliza Dacey was brutally murdered.  Within hours, her killer was caught.  Wasn't he?  So reads the opening titles of Jack Quick's new true-crime documentary.  A skilled producer, Jack knows that the bigger the conspiracy, the higher the ratings. Curtis Wade, convicted of Eliza's murder on circumstantial evidence and victim of a biased police force, is the perfect subject. Millions of viewers agree.  Just before the finale, Jack uncovers a minor detail that may prove Curtis guilty after all. Convinced it will ruin his show, Jack disposes of the evidence and delivers the finale unedited: proposing that Curtis is innocent.  But when Curtis is released, and a new victim is found bearing horrifying similarities to the original murder, Jack realizes that he may have helped a guilty man out of jail. And, as the only one who knows the real evidence of the case, he is the only one who can send him back...

Some family secrets demand to be told . . . Connie lost her words at the age of five, the day she witnessed her mother and father's untimely death. Since then she has been all but mute, only being able to choke out a few select words. Now, years on, Connie's husband is on his deathbed and all she can do is quietly sit by his side.   But there are so many dreadful secrets locked up in Connie's silent prison. And time is running out to set them free . . .  Don’t Say A Word is by Rebecca Tinnelly.

A skinny young boy is found dead - his body carelessly stuffed into wheelie bin. Detective Superintendent Alan Banks and his team are called to investigate. Who is the boy, and where did he come from? Was he discarded as rubbish, or left as a warning to someone? He looks Middle Eastern, but no one on the East Side Estate has seen him before.  As the local press seize upon an illegal immigrant angle, and the national media the story of another stabbing, the police are called to investigate a less newsworthy death: a middle-aged heroin addict found dead of an overdose in another estate, scheduled for redevelopment.  Banks finds the threads of each case seem to be connected to the other, and to the dark side of organised crime in Eastvale. Does another thread link to his friend Zelda, who is facing her own dark side? The truth may be more complex - or much simpler - than it seems . . .  Many Rivers to Cross is by Peter Robinson.

October 2019

London 1963. The Beatles, Carnaby Street, mini-skirts. But the new mood hasn't reached the drab and fearful corridors of MI5 and MI6. Many agents joined the secret service to fight the Nazis. Now they are locked in a Cold War against the Russians.  And some of them are traitors.  The service has been shaken to its core by the high-profile defections of Cambridge-educated spies Burgess, MacLean and now Philby. Appalled at such flagrant breaches of British security, the Americans are demanding a rigorous review.  Harry Vaughan is brought back from Vienna to be part of it. The Chief asks him to join two investigators - Arthur Martin and Peter Wright - who are determined to clean out the stables, and the first target of their suspicions is the Deputy Director General of MI5, Graham Mitchell.  Harry slips back into a relationship with an old flame, Elsa, and joins the hunt - somewhat reluctantly. He is sceptical of the case against Mitchell and wary of the messianic fervour of the two spy-catchers. But the further the investigation goes - and the deeper his commitment to Elsa becomes - the greater the sense of paranoia and distrust that spreads through the 'wilderness of mirrors' that is the secret service. The only certainty is that no-one is above suspicion. Including Harry Vaughan. Witchfinder is by Andrew Williams.

November 2019

A cold case for Captain Benny Griessel and Vaughn Cupido of the Hawks - not what they were looking for. And a difficult case too, surrounded by mystery, lies and evasion. The body of Johnson Johnson, ex-cop, has been found by the side of a railway line. He appears to have jumped from the world's most luxurious train, and two suspicious characters seen with him have disappeared into thin air. The regular police have already failed to make progress and others are intent on muddying the waters.  Meanwhile in Bordeaux, Daniel Darret is settled in a new life on a different continent. But his skills as an international hit-man are required one more time, and Daniel is given no choice in the matter. He must hunt again - his prey the corrupt president of his homeland. Two strands of the same story become a race against time - for the Hawks to stop the assassination, for Daniel to evade the relentless Russian agents tracking him, for Benny Griessel to survive long enough to finally ask Alexa Bernard to marry him . . .  The Last Hunt is by Deon Meyer.

Yorkshire, 1845.  A young woman has gone missing from her home, Chester Grange, leaving no trace, save a large pool of blood in her bedroom and a slew of dark rumours about her marriage. A few miles away across the moors, the daughters of a humble parson, Charlotte, Emily, and Anne Bronte are horrified, yet intrigued.  Desperate to find out more, the sisters visit Chester Grange, where they notice several unsettling details about the crime scene: not least the absence of an investigation. Together, the young women realise that their resourcefulness, energy and boundless imaginations could help solve the mystery - and that if they don't attempt to find out what happened to Elizabeth Chester, no one else will.  The path to the truth is not an easy one, especially in a society which believes a woman's place to be in the home, not wandering the countryside looking for clues. But nothing will stop the sisters from discovering what happened to the vanished bride, even as they find their own lives are in great peril...  The vanished Bride is by Bella Ellis.  

You're at home with your family. You think you're safe. You're wrong... Ava's life is the kind other people envy: loving husband; great kids; beautiful house. Until the night a violent home invasion turns the dream into a nightmare, and leaves her beautiful daughter fighting to survive. And then things get worse. Ava realises that the attack wasn't random. Someone is targeting her family. Why? Who could hate them enough to kill?  Ava must find out what really happened that night, to save those she loves from even greater danger. But when everyone around you has been lying, how do you decide who to trust? And Ava has secrets of her own... In Her Eyes is by Sarah Alderson.