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05/31/2006: "The Dagger Awards - some thoughts from a writer"
This is the first year for the new Daggers – and it’s been hectic, especially for the committee. Now the shortlists are out, it’s interesting to see what’s appeared. The Duncan Lawrie shortlist is an interesting mix of established writers and relatively new ones. My To Be Read list has now expanded by three books (three of them I have already read, the Ann Cleeves, the Simon Beckett and the Laura Wilson, any of which would be good winners in my view) so I’m giving myself a pat on the back for spotting the best reads of the year. And I’m lamenting the good reads that didn’t make it onto the list.
The International Dagger, which is where translated books are to be found is a new category. Its establishment was controversial, to say the least. I’ve discussed this in detail in the blog on my website, www.carlabanks.co.uk so I won’t re-rehearse the arguments here. The entry, in this short year, was higher than the entry of translated books for the Gold Dagger last year, so my personal hope, as a fan of European and Scandanavian crime fiction, is that a lot of new authors – or new to me – will appear here. And I hope we might see writers from farther afield being translated, published in the UK and entered for this award. Again, my TBR pile is increased – by four this time. I’ve read the Fred Vargas (I read two of her books before I found out that Fred was a her not a him) and picked up the Andrea Camilleri as a ‘pot luck’. If I read two books a week, I will get through the TBR pile by Christmas – except it will have grown again by then.
And I’m really pleased to be on the Dagger in the Library shortlist. I’m a great fan of libraries as places that really work hard to promote reading. I do a lot of library events, especially as part of LadyKillers. Which brings me to the point that LadyKillers has done particularly well this year – two of us, Lesley Horton and I, are on the Dagger in the Library list.
Do awards matter? Some of the most popular authors have never won an award. I think they do. In some cases, an award can save a good writer from obscurity or even the scrap heap. With so many books being published, good writers can be missed, and publishers now require high sales from writers so a good writer can be dropped before the ‘slow burn’ route takes effect. Awards, let’s be honest, help to increase sales. But it’s also the recognition when someone with knowledge and expertise (in this case, library readers and librarians) says, ‘Yes, these books are very good.’ It makes all the solitary hours with a computer screen worth while.
Danuta Reah on Wednesday, May 31st 2006 @ 11:50 AM GMT [link]