Annal:2002 Dagger Award for Crime Novel
From AwardAnnals
Results of the Dagger Award in the year 2002. For a ranked list of books, try an honor roll:
- 2002 Gold Dagger
- 2002 Historical Dagger shortlist
- Score: 16.52
In this brilliant, highly entertaining, and intriguing novel, Jose Carlos Somoza intertwines two darkly compelling riddles, forcing us to confront the ways in which we interpret reality.
In ancient Athens, one of the pupils of Plato’s Academy is found dead. His idealistic teacher Diagoras is convinced the pupil’s death is not as accidental as it appears, and asks the famous Heracles Pontor, the “Decipherer of Enigmas,” to investigate. As the death toll rises, the two men find themselves drawn into the dangerous underworld of the Athenian aristocracy, risking…
- 2002 Silver Dagger
- Score: 8.52
Milo Milodragovitch is back in Texas, running the bar of his dreams and trying to do a little private investigating on the side. His relationship with his woman is on the rocks ever since his overnight fling with the classy, scotch-drinking Molly McBride. Now, she’s persuaded Milo to help her search for and bring to justice the lowlife who raped and murdered her sister. A simple stakeout turns hideously violent when it’s discovered that Molly’s prey is no ordinary miscreant, but a brute with major political connections. Soon Milo is calling on connections of his…
Scaredy Cat: A Detective Thorne Mystery
- 2003 Barry-British nominee
- 2002 Dagger shortlist
- Score: 12.53
It was a calculated, vicious murder. The killer selected his victim at Euston station, followed her home on the tube, and then strangled her to death in front of her child. At the same time the dead woman is found, a second body is discovered at the back of King’s Cross station—killed in identical fashion. It is a grisly coincidence that eerily echoes the murders of two other women, both stabbed to death months before on the same day.
Introduced in Sleepyhead, Detective Inspector Tom Thorne sees the link and comes to the horrifying conclusion that it…
- 2003 Edgar–Novel nominee
- 2003 Macavity-Novel nominee
- 2002 Dagger shortlist
- 2002 Hammett nominee
- Score: 24.53
When a beautiful teenage girl is killed, the victim of a particularly savage rape, New Iberia, Louisiana, police detective Dave Robicheaux senses from the very start of the investigation that the most likely suspect, Tee Bobby Hulin, is not the actual killer. Though a drug addict and general ne’er-do-well, Hulin just doesn’t fit the profile for this kind of brutal crime.
But when another murder occurs—this victim a drugged-out prostitute who happens to be the daughter of one of the local mafia bigwigs—all clues once again point to Tee Bobby Hulin, and the…
- 2003 Anthony-Novel winner
- 2003 Barry-Novel winner
- 2003 Edgar–Novel nominee
- 2003 Macavity-Novel nominee
- 2002 Dagger shortlist
- Score: 38.53
When the bones of a 12-year-old boy are found scattered in the Hollywood Hills, Harry Bosch is drawn into a case that brings up the darkest memories from his own haunted past. The bones have been buried for years, but the cold case doesn’t deter Bosch. Unearthing hidden stories, he finds the child’s identity and reconstructs his fractured life, determined that he not be forgotten.
At the same time, a new love affair with a female cop begins to blossom for Bosch-until a stunningly blown mission leaves Bosch in more trouble that ever before in his turbulent…
- 2002 Dagger shortlist
- Score: 6.52
Acid Row. The name beleaguered inhabitants give their crime-riddled, decaying housing project. It’s a no-man’s land of single mothers and fatherless children, where angry, alienated youths control the streets.
Into this battleground comes Sophie Morrison, a young doctor visiting a patient there-and unaware that she is entering the home of a known pedophile. With reports circulating that a child has disappeared into this bedlam, the vigilantes are out in force. Sophie is trapped at the center of this terrifying siege, wth a man who can and will harm her…and the mob is out for blood.
