2021 Agatha Award Winners

This past weekend was the Malice Domestic conference and here are this year's Agatha Award Winners! (For a complete list of nominees, click here.)

Best Contemporary Novel
Cajun Kiss of Death by Ellen Byron (Crooked Lane Books)

Best Historical Novel
Death at Greenway by Lori Rader-Day (HarperCollins)

Best First Novel
Arsenic and Adobo by Mia P. Manansala (Berkley)

Best Short Story
"Bay of Reckoning" by Shawn Reilly Simmons in Murder on the Beach (Destination Murders)

Best Non-Fiction
How to Write a Mystery: A Handbook from Mystery Writers of America by MWA with editors Lee Child and Laurie R. King (Simon & Schuster)

Best Children's/YA Mystery
I Play One on TV by Alan Orloff (Down & Out Books)

>1 genesisdiem: Thanks for posting this. It's certainly something a Mystery and Suspense group should have.

>1 genesisdiem: >2 Carol420: I’ve not even heard of any of these books. The only book i have read from the nominations is The Madness of Crowds by Louise Penny and loved that.

Winners for this year:

The Agatha Award Winners
We are pleased to announce the winners of the 2022 Agatha Awards.
Congratulations to all of the Nominees and Winners!

​​2022
**WINNERS**

Best Contemporary Novel
Bayou Book Thief, Ellen Byron (Berkley Prime Crime)
Death By Bubble Tea, Jennifer J. Chow (Berkley)
Fatal Reunion, Annette Dashofy (Level Best Books)
Dead Man's Leap, Tina de Bellegarde (Level Best Books)
**A World of Curiosities, Louise Penny (Minotaur)**

Best Historical Novel
The Counterfeit Wife, Mally Becker (Level Best Books)
**Because I Could Not Stop for Death, Amanda Flower (Berkley)**
The Lindbergh Nanny, Mariah Fredericks (Minotaur)
In Place of Fear, Catriona McPherson (Mobius)
Under a Veiled Moon, Karen Odden (Crooked Lane Books)

Best First Novel
**Cheddar Off Dead, Korina Moss (St. Martin’s)**
Death in the Aegean, M. A. Monnin (Level Best Books)
The Bangalore Detectives Club, Harini Nagendra (Constable)
Devil’s Chew Toy, Rob Osler (Crooked Lane Books)
The Finalist, Joan Long (Level Best Books)
The Gallery of Beauties, Nina Wachsman (Level Best Books)

Best Short Story
**"Beauty and the Beyotch," Barb Goffman (Sherlock Holmes Mystery Magazine, Feb. 2022)**
"There Comes a Time," Cynthia Kuhn, Malice Domestic Murder Most Diabolical (Wildside Press)
"Fly Me to the Morgue," Lisa Q Mathews, Malice Domestic Mystery Most Diabolical (Wildside Press)
"The Minnesota Twins Meet Bigfoot," Richie Narvaez, Land of 10,000 Thrills, Bouchercon Anthology (Down & Out Books)
"The Invisible Band," Art Taylor, Edgar & Shamus Go Golden (Down & Out Books)

Best Non-Fiction
The Life of Crime: Detecting the History of Mysteries and Their Creators, Martin Edwards (HarperCollins)
The Handbook to Agatha Christie: The Bloomsbury Handbook to Agatha Christie, Mary Anna Evans and J. C. Bernthal (Bloomsbury Academic)
The Science of Murder: The Forensics of Agatha Christie, Carla Valentine (Sourcebooks)
**Promophobia: Taking the Mystery Out of Promoting Crime Fiction, Diane Vallere Ed. (Sisters in Crime)**
Agatha Christie: An Elusive Woman, Lucy Worsley (Pegasus Crime)

​Best Children's/YA Mystery
Daybreak on Raven Island, Fleur Bradley (Viking Books for Young People)
In Myrtle Peril, Elizabeth C. Bunce (Algonquin Young Readers)
#shedeservedit, Greg Herren (Bold Strokes Books)
Sid Johnson and the Phantom Slave Stealer, Frances Schoonmaker (Auctus Publishers)
**Enola Holmes and the Elegant Escapade, Nancy Springer (Wednesday Books)**