It’s always a real privilege for me to be a part of the annual Ngaio Marsh Awards. These awards celebrate the best in New Zealand crime writing, and it is exciting to be on the judging panel. This year’s finalists for the Ngaio Marsh Award for Best Crime Novel make up a diverse and engaging group, and all reflect very well on New Zealand crime writing. Have a look and see for yourself:

 

 

 

Dice – Claire Baylis 

The blurb:

Four teenage boys invent a sex game based on the toss of a dice.The police charge them with multiple sexual offenses against three teenage girls.
Twelve jurors must work out what actually happened.
How does the jury find?
Dice is a stunning courtroom drama told from the perspective of a diverse group of ordinary people – the jury. How will twelve women and men of different ages, backgrounds and beliefs decide whether consent was given or crimes were committed?
In this dazzlingly accomplished and gripping debut novel, the story is told through the eyes of each juror as the trial unfolds and evidence is presented, withheld, fragmented and retold by different witnesses.
Will the verdict deliver justice or punish the innocent? Where does the truth lie?

 

The Caretaker – Gabriel Bergmoser

The blurb:

An isolated, empty ski resort in the off-season. A woman who doesn’t want to be found. A man who may not be who he appears to be. A game of cat and mouse – with deadly consequences.
On the run from a controlling husband and his underworld associates in Melbourne, Charlotte has adopted a new identity and found a job as an off-season caretaker in a tiny, deserted alpine resort. Some dangerous people are looking for Charlotte and so she’s lying low, tending to the lodges, happy to be alone, but jumping every time a floor creaks or the wind whistles through the empty buildings. She’s trying to convince herself she’s okay, that she got away. But then strange things start happening around the resort. And Charlotte starts to realise that every escape route is being sealed off, one by one.

 

Ritual of Fire – D.V. Bishop

The blurb:

A night patrol finds a rich merchant hanged and set ablaze in the city’s main piazza. More than mere murder, this killing is intended to put the fear of God into Florence. Forty years earlier on this date, puritanical monk Girolamo Savonarola was executed the same way in the same place. Does this new killing mean Savonarola’s vengeful spirit has risen again?
Or are his fanatical disciples plotting to revive the monk’s regime of holy terror? Cesare Aldo has his suspicions but is hunting thieves and fugitives in the Tuscan countryside, leaving Constable Carlo Strocchi to investigate the ritual killing. When another important merchant is slain even more publicly than the first, those rich enough to escape the summer heat are fleeing to their country estates. But the Tuscan hills can also be dangerous places.
Soon growing religious fervor combines with a scorching heatwave to drive the city ever closer to madness, while someone is stalking powerful men that forged lifelong alliances during the dark days of Savonarola and his brutal followers. Unless Aldo and Strocchi can work together to stop the killer, Florence could become a bonfire of the vanities once more…

 

Pet – Catherine Chidgey

The blurb:

Like every other girl in her class, twelve-year-old Justine is drawn to her glamorous, charismatic new teacher and longs to be her pet. However, when a thief begins to target the school, Justine’s sense that something isn’t quite right grows ever stronger. With each twist of the plot, this gripping story of deception and the corrosive power of guilt takes a yet darker turn. Justine must decide where her loyalties lie.
Set in New Zealand in the 1980s and probing themes of racism, misogyny and the oppressive reaches of Catholicism, Pet will take a rightful place next to other classic portraits of childhood betrayal and psychological suspense: Peter Jackson’s Heavenly Creatures, Peter Weir’s Picnic at Hanging Rock, and Marilynne Robinson’s Housekeeping among them.

 

Devil’s Breath – Jill Johnson

The blurb:

I’ve always been better with plants than people . . .
Eustacia Rose is a Professor of Botanical Toxicology who lives alone in London with only her extensive collection of poisonous plants for company. She tends to her garden with meticulous care. Her life is quiet. Her schedule never changes. Until the day she hears a scream and the temptation to investigate proves irresistible.
Through her telescope, Professor Rose is drawn into the life of an extraordinarily beautiful neighbour, Simone, and nicknames the men who visit her after poisonous plants according to the toxic effect they have on Simone. But who are these four men? And why does Eustacia Rose recognize one of them?
Just as she preserves her secret garden, she feels inexplicably compelled to protect her neighbour. But when her precious garden is vandalized and someone close to Simone is murdered with a toxin derived from a rare poisonous plant, Eustacia finds herself implicated in the crime and decides to take matters into her own hands . . .

 

Going Zero – Anthony McCarten

The blurb:

TWO HOURS TO VANISH.
ONE CHANCE TO ESCAPE.
ZERO ALTERNATIVES.
Ten Americans have been carefully selected to Beta test a ground-breaking piece of spyware. FUSION can track anyone on earth. But does it work?
For one contestant, an unassuming Boston librarian named Kaitlyn Day, the stakes are far higher than money, and her reasons for entering the test more personal than anyone imagines.  When the timer hits zero, there will only be one winner…
 

Expectant – Vanda Symon

The blurb:

A killer targeting pregnant women.
A detective expecting her first baby…
The shocking murder of a heavily pregnant woman throws the New Zealand city of Dunedin into a tailspin, and the devastating crime feels uncomfortably close to home for Detective Sam Shephard as she counts down the days to her own maternity leave.
Confined to a desk job in the department, Sam must find the missing link between this brutal crime and a string of cases involving mothers and children in the past. As the pieces start to come together and the realisation dawns that the killer’s actions are escalating, drastic measures must be taken to prevent more tragedy.
For Sam, the case becomes personal, when it becomes increasingly clear that no one is safe and the clock is ticking…

Aren’t they all great? Watch this space to find out who the winner will be!

NOTE: The title of this post is the title of a song by The Clean