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Critiquing some of the most interesting recent crime, mystery, and thriller releases. Click on the individual covers to read more.
• Julie Hennrikus, the executive director of Sisters in Crime, has been chosen to receive the 2026 David Thompson Special Service Award. This prize, named in honor of a Texas bookstore owner and crime-fiction publisher who passed away back in 2010 , recognizes Hennrikus for her “extraordinary efforts to develop and promote the crime-fiction field.” In addition to her work for SinC, Hennrikus is…
If there’s one thing I’ve learned over these last three weeks spent posting tributes to fictional private detectives in Killer Covers , it’s that I cannot keep two blogs cruising along simultaneously at a lively clip. While I have produced two dozen posts in Killer Covers during this period, my work on The Rap Sheet has slowed to a crawl. Nonetheless, I am pleased with my efforts on that sister…
It’s been a good long while since I put together one of these news bits columns, so I have some serious catching-up to do! • The finalists for 2026’s Hammett Prize have been announced by the International Association of Crime Writers, North American Branch. This commendation is presented annually to a work, published in the previous year, that judges say demonstrates “literary excellence in crime…
Sisters in Crime Australia has announced its shortlists of books being considered for the 2026 Davitt Awards. The winners will be revealed on Friday, September 12, during a special ceremony in Melbourne. Adult Fiction: • At Café 64 , by Shaeden Barry (Echo) • Learned Behaviours , by Zeyneb Gamieldien (Ultimo Press) • Unbury the Dead , by Fiona Hardy (Affirm Press) • Mad Mabel , by Sally Hepworth…
Part of a series honoring the late author and blogger Bill Crider . Keep Cool, Mr. Jones , by Timothy Fuller (Dell, 1952), with a front cover painted by Robert Stanley . Author Fuller was still a student at Harvard University when he published his first mystery novel, Harvard Has a Homicide (1936). It introduced Edmund “Jupiter” Jones, described as a cocky, “eccentric grad student in the fine arts…
These days, there are so many prizes given in the field of crime, mystery, and thriller fiction, that it’s easy to fall behind in reporting them all. So consider this essentially a catch-up post. Yesterday, the International Association of Media Tie-in Writers announced the winners of its 2026 Scribe Awards for “excellence in the field of writing tie-in fiction for media franchises.” There were…
Last evening brought the news that British crime novelist Elly Griffiths (aka Domenica de Rosa) has won this year’s Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year award for The Frozen People (Quercus). Also contending for that prize were The Midnight King , by Tariq Ashkanani (Viper); The Death of Us , by Abigail Dean (Hemlock Press); Beautiful Ugly , by Alice Feeney (Pan); Clown Town , by Mick…
Critiquing some of the most interesting recent crime, mystery, and thriller releases. Click on the individual covers to read more.
The organizers of this year’s Killer Nashville conference, scheduled to take place in the Tennessee capital from August 20 to 23, have announced the finalists for their Silver Falchion Awards. There are 18 categories of nominees in all, but two that might be of particular interest to Rap Sheet readers are featured below. Best Mystery: • The Demonologists’ Legacy , by K. Scott Culpepper (Scotland)…
