Sponsors: The Estate of Ellis Peters, Headline Book Publishing Company and Little, Brown Book Group
Thursday October 29th: Philip Kerr has won the Crime Writers’ Association’s prestigious Ellis Peters Historical Award with his wartime novel If The Dead Rise Not. Philip’s success was announced at a presentation ceremony held at Six Fitzroy Square, London.
Established for the best historical crime novel (set in any period up to 35 years prior to the year in which the award will be made) by an author of any nationality, the award commemorates the life and work of Ellis Peters (Edith Pargeter) (1913-1995), a prolific author perhaps best known as the creator of Brother Cadfael.
CWA chair Margaret Murphy said: “The judging panel was mightily impressed by the exceptional quality of novels entered into the award – even commending two authors on the longlist. Philip Kerr is a truly worthy recipient of the prize.”
The judging panel said of his book, which is published by Quercus:: ‘Bernard Gunther, ex-Berlin cop, now house detective in the first-class Hotel Adlon as Nazi power becomes unstoppable, grapples with murder, corruption and the politics involved with Berlin’s 1936 hosting of the Olympic Games. Nearly twenty years later Bernie faces echoes of that time in pre-Castro Cuba, where he once more becomes involved with murder, corruption and politics. A tightly controlled plot twists and turns in a wryly witty narrative and the historical settings breathe reality.’
SYNOPSIS: Berlin 1934. The Nazis have been in power for just eighteen months but already Germany has seen some unpleasant changes. As the city prepares to host the 1936 Olympics, Jews are being expelled from all German sporting organisations – a blatant example of discrimination.
Forced to resign as a homicide detective with Berlin’s Criminal Police, Bernie is now house detective at the famous Adlon Hotel. The discovery of two bodies – one a businessman and the other a Jewish boxer – involves Bernie in the lives of two hotel guests. One is a beautiful left-wing journalist intent on persuading America to boycott the Berlin Olympiad; the other is a German-Jewish gangster who plans to use the Olympics to enrich himself and the Chicago mob. As events unfold, Bernie uncovers a vast labour and construction racket designed to take advantage of the huge sums the Nazis are prepared to spend to showcase the new Germany to the world. It is a plot that finds its conclusion twenty years later in pre-revolution Cuba, the country to which Bernie flees from Argentina at the end of A Quiet Flame.
Philip Kerr was born in Edinburgh but now lives in London and in Cornwall. He is the author of five other acclaimed Bernie Gunther novels and is acknowledged as one of today’s finest thriller writers. If the Dead Rise Not recently won the €125,000 RBA international prize for crime writing.
Also shortleted were:
Rennie Airth: The Dead of Winter (Macmillan)
Shona MacLean: The Redemption of Alexander Seaton (Quercus)
Mark Mills: The Intelligence Officer (HarperCollins)
Andrew Williams: The Interrogator (John Murray)
Laura Wilson: An Empty Death (Orion Publishing Group)
More details about those shortlised books on the shortlists page.
Janet Laurence (Chair) - author of the Darina Lisle and Canaletto crime series, and Writing Crime Fiction, former chair of the CWA
Geoffrey Bailey – Bookseller specialising in crime
Sir Bernard Ingham – Press Secretary to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and crime fiction fan
Maureen Lyle – Crime reviewer and enthusiastic reader
Eileen Roberts – Originator and organiser of St Hilda’s annual crime symposium in Oxford, mystery and crime enthusiast