LA Times Book Prize; Anthony Award Ballots

Last night the LA Times announced its Book Festival Prize finalists and the mystery/thriller category is quite interesting:

Benjamin Black, CHRISTINE FALLS: A NOVEL (Henry Holt)
Ake Edwardson, FROZEN TRACKS: AN INSPECTOR ERIK WINTER NOVEL (Viking)
Karin Fossum (Translated by Charlotte Barslund) THE INDIAN BRIDE (Harcourt)
Tana French, IN THE WOODS (Viking)
Jan Costin Wagner (Translated by John Brownjohn) ICE MOON (Harcourt)

I’m digging all the translated Scandinavian novels and have already expressed my admiration for Black and French’s book, but yes, insert obligatory debate here.

As for the Anthony Awards, if you’ve signed up for Bouchercon 2008 in Baltimore (and if not, why not?) then your ballot should be on the way – and there’s a new category included for Best Mystery Website/Blog. As organizers Ruth Jordan and Judy Bobalik write, “The final category was a no-brainer to the committee. For fifteen years

we’ve kept up with our community on-line and the people who bring this

information to us deserve to and should be recognized by the mystery

community.”

And unrelated to mystery novels in any way, shape or form, but still required reading: Nicholson Baker on Wikipedia. Just about the best way to start my Friday morning. (via)