2025 MACAVITY AWARD NOMINEES

The Mystery Readers International announced the nominees for the 2025 Macavity Awards as follows:

BEST MYSTERY NOVEL (6):
Hall of Mirrors, by John Copenhaver (Pegasus Crime)
Served Cold, by James L'Etoile (Level Best Books)
The God of the Woods, by Liz Moore (Riverhead)
California Bear, by Duane Swierczynski (Mulholland)
The In Crowd, by Charlotte Vassell (Doubleday)
All the Colors of the Dark, by Chris Whitaker (Crown)

BEST FIRST MYSTERY NOVEL (6):
Outraged, by Brian Copeland (Dutton)
A Reluctant Spy, by David Goodman (Headline)
Ghosts of Waikiki, by Jennifer K. Morita (Crooked Lane)
You Know What You Did, by K.T. Nguyen (Dutton)
The Expat, by Hansen Shi (Pegasus Crime)
Holy City, by Henry Wise (Atlantic Monthly Press)

BEST MYSTERY SHORT STORY (5):
"Home Game," by Craig Faustus Buck (Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, July/August 2024)
"The Postman Always Flirts Twice," by Barb Goffman (in Agatha and Derringer Get Cozy, edited by Gay Toltl Kinman & Andrew McAlear; Down & Out Books)
"Curse of the Super Taster," by Leslie Karst (Black Cat Weekly, Feb 23, 2024)
"Two for One," by Art Taylor (in Murder, Neat, by Michael Bracken & Barb Goffman; Level Short)
"Satan's Spit," by Gabriel Valjan (in Tales of Music, Murder, and Mayhem, edited by Heather Graham; Down & Out Books)
"Reynisfjara," by Kristopher Zgorski (in Mystery Most International, edited Rita Owen, VerenaRose & Shawn Reilly Simmons, Level Short)

BEST HISTORICAL MYSTERY (6):
The Wharton Plot by Mariah Fredericks (Minotaur)
An Art Lover's Guide to Paris and Murder, by Dianne Freeman (Kensington)
Fog City, by Claire Johnson (Level Best Books)
The Murder of Mr. Ma, by John Shen Yen Nee and S.J. Rozan (Soho Crime)
The Bootlegger's Daughter, by Nadine Nettmann (Lake Union)
A Grave Robbery, by Deanna Raybourn (Berkley)

BEST NONFICTION/CRITICAL (6):
Writing the Cozy Mystery: Authors' Perspectives on Their Craft, edited by Phyllis M. Betz (McFarland)
Some of My Best Friends Are Murderers: Critiquing the Columbo Killers, by Chris Chan (Level Best Books)
Witch of New York: The Trials of Polly Bodine and the Cursed Birth of Tabloid Justice, by Alex Hortis (Pegasus Crime)
The Infernal Machine: A True Story of Dynamite, Terror, and the Rise of the Modern Detective, by Steven Johnson (Crown)
On Edge: Gender and Genre in the Work of Shirley Jackson, Patricia Highsmith, and Leigh Brackett, by Ashley Lawson (Ohio State University Press)
Abingdon's Boardinghouse Murder, by Greg Lilly (History Press)

The winners will be announced in September.

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