CRIME WRITERS OF CANADA
is pleased to announce the nominees for the 2007 Arthur Ellis Awards

The year 2007 marks the 24th year for the prestigious Arthur Ellis Awards, named after the nom de travail of Canada's official hangman and recognizing excellence in Canadian crime writing.

Awards are presented in six categories for works in the crime genre published for the first time in the previous year by authors living in Canada, regardless of their nationality, or by Canadian writers living outside of Canada.

For the 2007 awards, Crime Writers of Canada is thrilled to announce a new seventh category: the Arthur Ellis Award for Best Unpublished First Crime Novel (aka the Unhanged Arthur).

The winners will be announced at the Arthur Ellis Awards dinner on Thursday, June 7, at Mysteriously Yours…Dinner Theatre in Toronto.

The nominees for this year's awards are:

Best Short Story
Vicki Cameron, “Lady in Violet Satin” in Storyteller (Fall 2006)
Karl El-Koura, “The Curious Case of the Book Baron” in Storyteller (Spring 2006)
Barbara Fradkin, “Voices from the Deep” in Dead in the Water (RendezVous Press)
Jennifer Geens, “Canadian Diamonds” in Storyteller (Summer 2006)
Dennis Richard Murphy, “Fuzzy Wuzzy” in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine (August 2006)

Best Non-Fiction
Edward Butts, The Desperate Ones: Forgotten Canadian Outlaws (Dundurn Press)
Guy Lawson & William Oldham, The Brotherhoods: The True Story of Two Cops Who Murdered for the Mafia (Scribner/Simon & Schuster)
Mike McIntyre, To the Grave: A Spectacular RCMP Sting (Great Plains Publications)
Brian O’Dea, High: Confessions of a Pot Smuggler (Random House Canada)
Linda Spalding, Who Named the Knife (McClelland & Stewart)

Best Juvenile
Marty Chan, The Mystery of the Graffiti Ghoul (Thistledown Press)
Sean Cullen, Hamish X and the Cheese Pirates (Penguin Canada)
L.M. Falcone, The Devil, The Banshee and Me (Kidscan Press)
Norah McClintock, Tell (Orca)
Monique Polak, All In (James Lorimer)

Best Crime Writing in French
Because of the low number of submissions to this category, unfortunately, there is no French award for 2007.

Best First Novel
Glen Bonham, The Elvis Interviews (Battlefield Publishing)
Anne Emery, Sign of the Cross (ECW Press)
Stephen Kimber, Reparations (HarperCollins Canada)
Grant McCrea, Dead Money (Random House Canada)
David Russell, Deadly Lessons (Rendezvous Press)

Best Novel
Linwood Barclay, Lone Wolf (Bantam/RHC)
Emma Cole, Every Secret Thing (Allison & Busby)
Barbara Fradkin, Honour Among Men (RendezVous Press)
Kathy Reichs, Break No Bones (Scribner/Simon & Schuster)
Peter Robinson, Piece of My Heart (McClelland & Stewart)

Best Unpublished First Crime Novel (the Unhanged Arthur)
Jennifer Hemstock, Murder in a Cold Climate
Meika Erinn McClurg, Ego Tenderloin
Rosemary McCracken, Last Date
Phyllis Smallman, Margarita Nights
Kevin Thornton, Condemned

There were also eight submissions to the Unhanged Arthur that the judges felt were deserving of honourable mention:
Pam Barnsley, This Cage of Bones
Tim Cramp, Dead Witness List
Trish Dyer, Home Away
Tania Finch, Cold Cuts
Matthew Fries, Betrayal
Meg Howald, Expatriate Bones
Josephine Leonard-Bezeau, The Bogeyman in the Closet
Coleen Steele, Angel’s Share

We again had a bumper crop of submissions this year, thus proving that crime (writing) is a thriving business. But don't take our word for it -- why not read some of the submissions yourself. Here are the lists of published books and short stories received by Arthur:

• Best crime novel (by a previously published novelist)

• Best first crime novel (by an author who has never had a novel of any kind published commercially)

• Best crime short story

• Best crime nonfiction

• Best juvenile crime book

• Best crime publication in French

Because judging for the Unhanged Arthur is blind and because these works are not available to readers in general, we are not posting the Unhanged Arthur submission list.

The award itself, the Arthur, is hand-carved by Canadian artisan Barry Lambeck and based on a design and prototype by artist Peter Blais. Arthur is a wooden articulated jumping-jack figure with a noose around its neck that "dances" when a string is pulled.

The Arthurs will be presented on June 7, 2007, in Toronto at the 24th annual Arthur Ellis Awards dinner, which attracts a wide range of authors, publishers, and fans of mysteries and crime writing. We will announce the venue later. 

Past winners of the Arthur include most of the major names in Canadian crime writing, including Howard Engel, Eric Wright, Peter Robinson, the late L.R. Wright, Giles Blunt, Carol Shields, William Deverell, Gail Bowen, Ann Lamontagne, Kathy Reichs, James Dubro, John Lawrence Reynolds, Norbert Spehner, Rosemary Aubert, and Andrew Pyper.

The CWC would like to thank our sponsors:

• Sleuth of Baker Street (Toronto) for sponsoring the Best Crime Novel award,
• Book City (Toronto) for sponsoring the Best First Crime Novel award, and
• McArthur & Company for sponsoring the Best Unpublished First Crime Novel award.