Daggers 2023 To Best Books Of Crime Writings

If you're looking for a good crime novel to read on these longer autumn nights, take a look at the winners of the oldest crime writing awards - the prestigious Crime Writers’ Association (CWA) Daggers.

The jubilee 70th edition of the CWA Daggers has handed the Gold Dagger, given to the overall best crime novel of the year, from thrillers to mysteries, procedurals to psychological suspense, to George Dawes Green's The Kingdoms of Savannah. Judges praised the ‘intricately constructed’ novel as a ‘timeless fable.’ A masterpiece of Southern Gothic noir, George Dawes Green’s sprawling mystery explores class and power structures after a brutal murder.

John Brownlow's Agent Seventeen was announced the winner of the Ian Fleming Steel Dagger, awarded for the best espionage, psychological, or adventure thriller novel. It centres on an elite hitman who must remain one step ahead of his many rivals if he wants to stay alive. It was praised by the judges as a ‘deceptively layered’ blockbuster thriller and ‘roller-coaster’ tale.

The title of the best debut crime novel of the year and the ILP John Creasey (New Blood) Dagger went to Hayley Scrivenor for Dirt Town, which follows the case of a missing girl in small-town Australia.

The CWA Historical Dagger was handed to DV Bishop for The Darkest Sin. Set in Renaissance Florence, it is an atmospheric historical thriller that judges praised as ‘well-researched’ and ‘gripping to the end.’ Meanwhile The Crime Fiction in Translation Dagger was awarded to Javier Cercas for Even the Darkest Night, translated by Anne McLean.