Last night, the Mystery Writers of America announced the winners of the 2018 Edgar Awards, honoring the very best of the crime and mystery world at a ceremony in midtown Manhattan.

Photo by Aslan Chalom

This year’s celebration was the 72nd Annual Gala Banquet hosted by the MWA to honor the genre’s greatest talents. Past Edgar winners include Margaret Millar, Raymond Chandler, John le Carré, Robert B. Parker, Elmore Leonard, Patricia Highsmith, Ruth Rendell (as Barbara Vine), Mo Hayder, and many more of the legendary authors working in the field.

Earlier this week, we caught up with some of MWA’s Special Award winners for a conversation on  the biggest issues facing the mystery community today. Today, we’re celebrating all the 2018 winners and nominees. Congratulations to all the authors on their deserving work.

Best Novel

WINNER: Bluebird, Bluebird by Attica Locke

NOMINEES:

The Dime by Kathleen Kent (Hachette Book Group – Little, Brown & Co./Mulholland Books)
Prussian Blue by Philip Kerr (Penguin Random House — Marian Wood Books/Putnam)
Bluebird, Bluebird by Attica Locke (Hachette Book Group – Little, Brown & Co./Mulholland Books)
A Rising Man by Abir Mukherjee (Pegasus Books)
The Twelve Lives of Samuel Hawley by Hannah Tinti (Penguin Random House — The Dial Press)

More from the authors on CrimeReads, Lit Hub, and Book Marks:

• Hannah Tinti talks crime and unconventional families
• Kathleen Kent on Texas activism and women’s rights
• Otto Penzler’s moving obituary following Philip Kerr’s death
• Molly Odintz reflects on the meaning of Bernie Gunther
• Attica Locke talks East Texas, racism, and small town secrets
• Read an exclusive excerpt from Abir Mukherjee’s latest mystery

Best First Novel

WINNER: She Rides Shotgun by Jordan Harper

NOMINEES:

She Rides Shotgun by Jordan Harper (HarperCollins — Ecco)
Dark Chapter by Winnie M. Li (Polis Books)
Lola by Melissa Scrivner Love (Penguin Random House — Crown)
Tornado Weather by Deborah E. Kennedy (Macmillan — Flatiron Books)
Idaho by Emily Ruskovich (Random House)

More from the authors on CrimeReads, Lit Hub, and Book Marks:

• Winnie M. Li on personal traumas and Jason Bourne
• An excerpt from Emily Ruskovich’s Idaho
• What the critics said about She Rides Shotgun

Best Paperback Original

WINNER: The Unseeing by Anna Mazzola

NOMINEES:

In Farleigh Field by Rhys Bowen (Amazon Publishing — Lake Union)
Ragged Lake by Ron Corbett (ECW Press)
Black Fall by Andrew Mayne (HarperCollins Publishers — Harper Paperbacks)
The Unseeing by Anna Mazzola (Sourcebooks — Sourcebooks Landmark)
Penance by Kanae Minato (Hachette Book Group — Little, Brown & Co./Mulholland Books)
The Rules of Backyard Cricket by Jock Serong (Text Publishing)

Best Fact Crime

WINNER: Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI
by David Grann

NOMINEES:

Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI
by David Grann (Penguin Random House — Doubleday)
The Road to Jonestown: Jim Jones and Peoples Temple by Jeff Guinn (Simon & Schuster)
American Fire: Love, Arson, and Life in a Vanishing Land by Monica Hesse
(W.W. Norton & Company — Liveright)
The Man From the Train: The Solving of a Century-Old Serial Killer Mystery
by Bill and Rachel McCarthy James (Simon & Schuster — Scribner)
Mrs. Sherlock Holmes: The True Story of New York City’s Greatest Female Detective and 
the 1917 Missing Girl Case that Captivated a Nation by Brad Ricca (St. Martin’s Press)

More from the authors on CrimeReads, Lit Hub, and Book Marks:

• David Grann on the horror of unspooling a real-life conspiracy
• Monica Hesse on writing true crime and YA
• Rachel McCarthy James on solving a century old crime
• The early days of Jim Jones, charismatic micromanager / lunatic

Best Critical/Biographical

WINNER: Chester B. Himes: A Biography by Lawrence P. Jackson

NOMINEES:

From Holmes to Sherlock: The Story of the Men and Women who Created an Icon
by Mattias Bostrom (Grove/Atlantic — The Mysterious Press)
Manderley Forever: A Biography of Daphne du Maurier by Tatiana de Rosnay (St. Martin’s Press)
Murder in the Closet: Essays on Queer Clues in Crime Fiction Before Stonewall by Curtis Evans (McFarland Publishing)
Chester B. Himes: A Biography by Lawrence P. Jackson (W.W. Norton & Company)
Arthur and Sherlock: Conan Doyle and the Creation of Holmes by Michael Sims (Bloomsbury USA)

More from the authors on CrimeReads, Lit Hub, and Book Marks:

• What the critics said about From Holmes to Sherlock
• What the critics said about Chester B. Himes: A Biography
• Michael Sims on how Sherlock Holmes got his name

Best Short Story

WINNER: “Spring Break” — New Haven Noir by John Crowley

NOMINEES:

“Spring Break” — New Haven Noir by John Crowley (Akashic Books)
“Hard to Get” — Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine by Jeffery Deaver (Dell Magazines)
“Ace in the Hole” — Montana Noir by Eric Heidle (Akashic Books)
“A Moment of Clarity at the Waffle House” — Atlanta Noir by Kenji Jasper (Akashic Books)
“Chin Yong-Yun Stays at Home” — Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine by S.J. Rozan (Dell Magazines)

Best Juvenile

WINNER: Vanished! by James Ponti

NOMINEES:

Audacity Jones Steals the Show by Kirby Larson (Scholastic — Scholastic Press)
Vanished! by James Ponti (Simon & Schuster — Aladdin)
The Assassin’s Curse by Kevin Sands (Simon & Schuster — Aladdin)
First Class Murder by Robin Stevens (Simon & Schuster — Simon & Schuster BFYR)
NewsPrints by Ru Xu (Scholastic — Graphix)

Young Adult

WINNER: Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds

NOMINEES:

The Cruelty by Scott Bergstrom (Macmillan Children’s Publishing Group — Feiwel & Friends)
Grit by Gillian French (HarperCollins Publishers — HarperTeen)
The Impossible Fortress by Jason Rekulak (Simon & Schuster)
Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds (Simon & Schuster — Atheneum Books for Young Readers)
The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas (HarperCollins Publishers — Balzer + Bray)

TV Teleplay

WINNER: “Somebody to Love” — Fargo, Teleplay by Noah Hawley

NOMINEES:

“Episode 1” — Loch Ness, Teleplay by Stephen Brady (Acorn TV)
“Something Happened” — Law and Order: SVU, Teleplay by Michael Chernuchin
(NBC Universal/Wolf Entertainment)
“Somebody to Love” — Fargo, Teleplay by Noah Hawley (FX Networks/MGM)
“Gently and the New Age” — George Gently, Teleplay by Robert Murphy (Acorn TV)
“The Blanket Mire” — Vera, Teleplay by Paul Matthew Thompson & Martha Hillier (Acorn TV)

Mary Higgins Clark Award

WINNER: The Widow’s House by Carol Goodman

NOMINEES:

The Vineyard Victims by Ellen Crosby (Minotaur)
You’ll Never Know Dear by Hallie Ephron (HarperCollins — William Morrow)
The Widow’s House by Carol Goodman (HarperCollins — William Morrow Paperbacks)
Uncorking a Lie by Nadine Nettmann (Llewellyn Worldwide — Midnight Ink)
The Day I Died by Lori Rader-Day (HarperCollins — William Morrow Paperbacks)

To see the full list including the Special Award Winners, click here.