Shortlisting the Dagger of Daggers

Is it just me who giggles slightly at the name the CWA has bestowed upon their Ur-award for the alleged all-time greatest crime novel that has ever won the Gold Dagger? I’ve made a Handel joke about it already, and now I have weird visions of Sid Caesar and Imogene Coca hamming it up at the ceremony, but I digress…very much…

Anyway, the nominees are:

John Le Carre, THE SPY WHO CAME IN FROM THE COLD (1963)
Anthony Price, OTHER PATHS TO GLORY (1974)
Martin Cruz Smith, GORKY PARK (1981)
Peter Lovesey, THE FALSE INSPECTOR DEW (1982)
Barbara Vine, A FATAL INVERSION (1987)
Reginald Hill, BONES AND SILENCE (1990)
Val McDermid, THE MERMAIDS SINGING (1995)

Who’d have thought so many from the 1980s would make it on?

Though I suspect the frontrunner is Le Carre, my own pick is GORKY PARK — because it not only prompted a shift in what a crime fiction novel could cover, but it’s a book that’s both important from an industry standpoint and a readership standpoint. Never mind that it’s excellent.