Finalists For The Fingerprint Awards 2023 Announced
6 July 2023
Voted for by crime and thriller fans, the nominees for Capital Crime’s Fingerprint Awards have been announced with Ulverscroft titles across five categories.
Crime Book Of The Year
The Botanist by MW Craven
Published in CD and MP3 CD audiobook and uLibrary eAudiobook in July 2022.
Detective Sergeant Washington Poe can count on one hand the number of friends he has. And he'd still have his thumb left. There's the insanely brilliant civilian analyst Tilly Bradshaw, his beleaguered boss, Detective Inspector Stephanie Flynn, and his nearest neighbour, Victoria. And then there's Estelle Doyle. Her father's murder appears to be an open and shut case, but Estelle has firearms discharge residue on her hands and the only footprints going into the house are hers. Since her arrest she's only said three words: 'Tell Washington Poe.' Meanwhile, a poisoner the press have dubbed the Botanist is sending high profile celebrities poems and pressed flowers. The killer seems to be able to walk through walls and, regardless of the security measures the police take, he seems to be able to kill with impunity . . .
The It Girl by Ruth Ware
Published in Large Print in November 2022 and CD and MP3 CD audiobook in October 2022.
April Clarke-Cliveden was the first person Hannah Jones met at Oxford. Vivacious, bright, occasionally vicious, and the ultimate It girl, she quickly pulled Hannah into her dazzling orbit. During their first term, they developed a group of devoted and inseparable friends: Will, Hugh, Ryan, and Emily. By the end of their second term, April was dead. Now, a decade later, the man convicted of killing April - former Oxford porter John Neville - has died in prison. Hannah and Will are expecting their first child, and she's relieved to have finally put the past behind her. But her world is rocked when a young journalist comes knocking and presents new evidence that Neville may have been innocent. As Hannah reconnects with old friends and delves deeper into the mystery of April's death, she realizes that the friends she thought she knew all have something to hide...including a murder.
Bleeding Heart Yard by Elly Griffiths
Published in Large Print in November 2022.
DS Cassie Fitzherbert has a secret - one she's done her utmost to delete from her memory. In the 1990s, she and her schoolfriends killed a fellow pupil.
Thirty years later, Cassie is happily married and loves her job as a police officer. Then her husband persuades her to go to a school reunion - and former pupil Garfield Rice is found dead, supposedly from a drug overdose. As Garfield was an eminent MP and the investigation is high profile, it's headed by Cassie's new boss, DI Harbinder Kaur. The trouble is, Cassie can't shake the feeling that one of her old friends has killed again.
Is Cassie right, or was Garfield murdered by one of his political cronies? It's in Cassie's interest to skew the investigation to imply the latter - and she seems to be succeeding.
Until someone else from the reunion is found dead...
The Family Remains by Lisa Jewell
Published in Large Print in February 2023.
One June morning, on the bank of the River Thames, a black bin bag full of bones is discovered by mud-larkers. DI Samuel Owusu is called to the scene and quickly sends the bag for forensic examination. The skeletal remains are those of a young woman, killed by a blow to the head many years ago.
Also inside the bag is dead summer blossom from the Persian silk tree - a rarity in London. It leads DI Owusu back to a mansion in Chelsea where, many years ago, three people lay dead in a kitchen, and a baby waited upstairs for someone to pick her up. The clues point forward, too - to a brother and sister in Chicago, searching for the only person who can make sense of their pasts.
Four deaths. An unsolved mystery. A family whose secrets can't stay buried for ever...
The Twist Of A Knife by Anthony Horowitz
Published in Large Print in March 2023.
In an awkward meeting, author Anthony Horowitz finishes his writing partnership with former police detective Daniel Hawthorne. He's had his fill of following Hawthorne around on investigations, and his play Mindgame is about to open at the famous Vaudeville Theatre in the Strand. Not surprisingly, Hawthorne declines to be in the audience.
Mindgame is savagely reviewed by Sunday Times critic Harriet Throsby. The next day, Throsby is stabbed in the heart with an ornamental dagger: a weapon belonging to Anthony, which has his fingerprints all over it.
Arrested by his old enemy Detective Inspector Cara Grunshaw, thrown into prison, and brutally interrogated, Anthony is the prime suspect in Throsby's murder. When a second theatre critic dies in mysterious circumstances, the net closes in. Ever more desperate, the playwright realises that only one man can help him.
But will Hawthorne take the call?
Thriller Book Of The Year
Wrong Place Wrong Time by Gillian McAllister
Published in CD and MP3 CD audiobook in September 2022.
It's every parent's nightmare.
Your happy, funny, innocent son commits a terrible crime: murdering a complete stranger.
You don't know who.
You don't know why.
You only know your teenage boy is in custody - and his future lost.
Somewhere in the past lie the answers, and you don't have a choice but to find them...
Historical Book Of The Year
The Lost Man Of Bombay by Vaseem Khan
Published in CD and MP3 CD audiobook and uLibrary eAudiobook in September 2022.
Bombay, 1950. When the body of a white man is found frozen in the Himalayan foothills near Dehra Dun, he is christened the Ice Man by the national media. Who is he? How long has he been there? Why was he killed? As Inspector Persis Wadia and Metropolitan Police criminalist Archie Blackfinch investigate the case in Bombay, they uncover a trail left behind by the enigmatic Ice Man - a trail leading directly into the dark heart of conspiracy. Meanwhile, two new murders grip the city. Is there a serial killer on the loose, targeting Europeans?
Published in CD and MP3 CD audiobook and uLibrary eAudiobook in March 2022.
Paris, 1750. A new maid arrives at the home of a celebrated clockmaker and his clever, unworldly daughter. But rumours are stirring that Reinhart's uncanny mechanical creations - bejewelled birds, silver spiders - are more than mere automata. That they might defy the laws of nature, perhaps even at the expense of the living... But Madeleine is hiding a dark past, and a dangerous purpose - to discover the truth of the clockmaker's experiments and record his every move, in exchange for her own chance of freedom. Meanwhile, in the streets, children are quietly disappearing - and Madeleine comes to fear that she has stumbled upon a greater conspiracy. One which might reach to the heart of Versailles...
A Fatal Crossing by Tom Hindle
Published in CD and MP3 CD audiobook in May 2022.
November 1924. The Endeavour sets sail for New York, with 2,000 passengers - and a killer - on board.
When a body is found on deck, ship's officer Timothy Birch is ready to declare the death a tragic accident. But Scotland Yard inspector James Temple is certain there's more to this misfortune than meets the eye.
Mounting an investigation, the pair uncover the theft of a priceless painting, and encounter a string of suspects with secrets to hide.
Now, with just days remaining until the Endeavour reaches New York, their search for the culprit is fraught with danger.
And all the while, the passengers roam the ship with a killer in their midst...
Debut Book Of The Year
The Maid by Nita Prose
Published in large print in July 2022.
I am your maid.
I know about your secrets. Your dirty laundry.
But what do you know about me?
Molly the maid is all alone in the world. A nobody. She's used to being invisible in her job at the Regency Grand Hotel, plumping pillows and wiping away the grime, dust and secrets of the guests passing through. She's just a maid - why should anyone take notice?
But she is suddenly thrown into the spotlight when she discovers an infamous guest, Mr Black, very dead in his bed. This isn't a mess that can be easily cleaned up. And as Molly becomes embroiled in a hunt for the truth, following the clues whispering in the hallways of the Regency Grand, she discovers a power she never knew was there. She's just a maid - but what can she see that others overlook?
Wahala by Nikki May
Published in CD and MP3 CD audiobook in July 2022.
Ronke, Simi, Boo are three mixed-race friends living in London.
They have the gift of two cultures, Nigerian and English.
Not all of them choose to see it that way.
Everyday racism has never held them back, but now in their thirties, they question their future. Ronke wants a husband (he must be Nigerian); Boo enjoys (correction: endures) stay-at-home motherhood; while Simi, full of fashion career dreams, rolls her eyes as her boss refers to her urban vibe yet again.
When Isobel, a lethally glamorous friend from their past arrives in town, she is determined to fix their futures for them.
Cracks in their friendship begin to appear, and it is soon obvious Isobel is not sorting but wrecking. When she is driven to a terrible act, the women are forced to reckon with a crime in their past that may just have repeated itself.
A Fatal Crossing by Tom Hindle
Published in CD and MP3 CD audiobook in May 2022.
November 1924. The Endeavour sets sail for New York, with 2,000 passengers - and a killer - on board.
When a body is found on deck, ship's officer Timothy Birch is ready to declare the death a tragic accident. But Scotland Yard inspector James Temple is certain there's more to this misfortune than meets the eye.
Mounting an investigation, the pair uncover the theft of a priceless painting, and encounter a string of suspects with secrets to hide.
Now, with just days remaining until the Endeavour reaches New York, their search for the culprit is fraught with danger.
And all the while, the passengers roam the ship with a killer in their midst...
Audiobook Of The Year
The Ink Black Heart by Robert Galbraith
Published in CD and MP3 CD audiobook and uLibrary eAudiobook in September 2022.
When frantic, dishevelled Edie Ledwell appears in the office begging to speak to her, private detective Robin Ellacott doesn't know quite what to make of the situation. The co-creator of a popular cartoon, The Ink Black Heart, Edie is being persecuted by a mysterious online figure who goes by the pseudonym of Anomie. Edie is desperate to uncover Anomie's true identity.
Robin decides that the agency can't help with this - and thinks nothing more of it until a few days later, when she reads the shocking news that Edie has been tasered and then murdered in Highgate Cemetery, the location of The Ink Black Heart.
Robin and her business partner Cormoran Strike become drawn into the quest to uncover Anomie's true identity. But with a complex web of online aliases, business interests and family conflicts to navigate, Strike and Robin find themselves embroiled in a case that stretches their powers of deduction to the limits - and which threatens them in new and horrifying ways...
Better The Blood by Michael Bennett
Published in large print and CD and MP3 CD audiobook in September 2022.
Hana Westerman is a tenacious Maori detective juggling single motherhood and the pressures of her career in Auckland's Central Investigation Branch. When she's led to a crime scene by a mysterious video, she discovers a man hanging in a secret room. As Hana and her team work to track down the culprit, other deaths lead her to think that they are searching for New Zealand's first serial killer.
With little to go on, Hana must use all her experience as a police officer to try and find a motive to these apparently unrelated murders. What she eventually discovers is a link to an historic crime that leads back to the brutal bloody colonisation of New Zealand.
Then the pursuit becomes frighteningly personal, and Hana realises that, whilst her heritage is key to finding the killer, their agenda of revenge may include her - and her family...
The Twyford Code by Janice Hallett
Published in CD and MP3 CD audiobook and uLibrary eAudiobook in March 2022.
Forty years ago, Steven Smith found a copy of a famous children's book, its margins full of strange markings and annotations. He took it to his English teacher, Miss Isles, who became convinced it was the key to solving a secret code that ran through all Edith Twyford's novels. Then Miss Isles disappeared on a class field trip, and Steven's memory won't allow him to remember what happened. Desperate to recover his memories and find out what really happened, Steven revisits the people and places of his childhood. But it soon becomes clear that Edith Twyford wasn't just a writer of forgotten children's stories. The Twyford Code has great power, and he isn't the only one trying to solve it...