Edgar Awards

Andrew Martin, Charles Spicer, Kristen Lindquist, Paul Doiron

Well, I didn't win the 2010 Edgar Award for "Best First Novel," but I was pleased that Bruce DeSilva received the award for Rogue Island. Bruce is a great guy, and I heartily recommend his entertaining journey into Providence's heart of darkness.

The party was a real blast, too. I met Otto Penzler. Sara Paretsky dropped a glass of wine on my wife's shoe. And Steve Hamilton offered a moving tribute to the late legendary editor Ruth Cavin.

Also, I had the best cheering section in the entire room. In my time I've heard plenty of authors bitch about their publishers for assorted reasons. But I have had nothing but great experiences with the people at Minotaur Books. Thank you, guys, for everything.

Thrilling News

The International Thriller Writers announced their nominees for the ITW Thriller Awards today, and I was wonderstruck to hear that The Poacher's Son is up for "Best First Novel." Here are the other nominees:

 

  • Carla Buckley – The Things That Keep Us Here (Random House)
  • Paul Doiron – The Poacher's Son (Minatour)
  • Reece Hirsch – The Insider (Berkley)
  • Thomas Kaufman – Drink the Tea (Minatour)
  • Chevy Stevens – Still Missing (St. Martin’s)

 

The winner will be announced at Thrillerfest in July.

When I think about this past year and all the good things that have come my way, I feel so grateful. I suppose that being nominated for a bunch of awards might make some people feel full of themselves, but honestly, I find it humbling. Life moves in strange ways. 

Paperback Pub Day

Today is a special day in my career as an author, and yet I almost let it slip by without commentary. The paperback edition of The Poacher's Son — sporting a spiffy new jacket design that I prefer to the hard cover — was published today. The occasion isn't as momentous as having a brand new book in stores, but it's a big deal nonetheless. Many readers won't even consider buying a first novel until it's available as a less expensive paperback. So seeing your book appear in softcover is like watching it be reintroduced to the world. A new audience of readers is going to discover The Poacher's Son now that it's a trade paperback. That's definitely worth commemorating.

Publishers Weekly Finds Trespasser "Compelling"

One of the nice things about having a new book coming out is that you know, more or less, what to expect. Reviews will begin appearing a few months before the publication date. Your editor will email you about foreign rights sales (you hope). Your publicist will volunteer you to write a blog post on a mystery web site.

What you don't know, however, is when these things will happen.

So I had the experience of waking up this morning to the pleasant surprise of a review for Trespasser in the new Publishers Weekly:

In Doiron's compelling sequel to his debut, The Poacher's Son, troubled 25-year-old Mike Bowditch, a Maine game warden, is still coming to grips with the realization that his estranged father--now deceased--has become known as the state's most notorious murderer. Bowditch finds solace in his job, but when he investigates a car accident involving a deer on a remote stretch of road, the driver, 23-year-old Ashley Kim, from Cambridge, Mass., has disappeared. Later, in an empty house, he finds Kim's naked body, bound with sailor's rigging tape, with the word slut carved into her chest. As Bowditch becomes increasingly obsessed with finding the killer, he puts his already tenuous career in jeopardy as well as his equally tenuous relationship with his possibly pregnant girlfriend. Doiron complements this thriller's decidedly dark tone with introspective existential and spiritual musings and atmospheric imagery (houses in a fishing village "clung like barnacles" around a harbor).

It's always interesting to see what the reviewer fixates on: the atmosphere, the existential musings. "Decidedly dark?" Yes, I guess it is.