Edgar Nominees Announced!!

Oh frabjous day!  I am chortling in my joy.  Today is the day that the Mystery Writers of America announced the nominees for the 2015 Edgar awards.  This is usually on January 19 (Edgar Allan Poe’s birthday), but we had an extra wait thanks to the MLK Day holiday.

This year, the best novel race is a six-way dash… and four of the authors are people that I know, love and have been furiously recommending.  The Best First Novel by an American Author category, as usual, is an opportunity to get some new favorites.  None of those authors are remotely familiar to me!

As in previous years, I will be reading (or in some cases, re-reading), reviewing and ranking the books.  And following April’s Edgar Banquet in New York City, I‘ll see how the Literary Lunchbox Edgar Awards match up with the real thing.  In the interests of honest disclosure, I must reveal that I do not bat .1000.  Part of this is because I’m not trying to guess which book will win, but to determine which book SHOULD win.  Big difference.

So, with that being said, here’s the line-up for 2015!

BEST NOVEL

• This Dark Road to Mercy by Wiley Cash (HarperCollins Publishers – William Morrow)
• Wolf by Mo Hayder (Grove/Atlantic – Atlantic Monthly Press)
• Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King (Simon & Schuster – Scribner)
• The Final Silence by Stuart Neville (Soho Press)
• Saints of the Shadow Bible by Ian Rankin (Hachette Book Group – Little, Brown)
• Coptown by Karin Slaughter (Penguin Randomhouse – Ballantine Books)

BEST FIRST NOVEL BY AN AMERICAN AUTHOR

• Dry Bones in the Valley by Tom Bouman (W.W. Norton)
• Invisible City by Julia Dahl (Minotaur Books)
• The Life We Bury by Allen Eskens (Prometheus Books – Seventh Street Books)
• Bad Country by C.B. McKenzie (Minotaur Books – A Thomas Dunne Book)
• Shovel Ready by Adam Sternbergh (Crown Publishers)
• Murder at the Brightwell by Ashley Weaver (Minotaur Books – A Thomas Dunne Book)