Eagerly awaiting the Edgar Awards

While I may have mixed feelings about the Oscar nominations announced this week(very happy for America Ferrera being up for Best Supporting Actress in Barbie but wish the director and lead actress were similarly honored), it’s all good for this year’s Edgar Awards.

This set of awards are for mystery/thrillers/suspense,etc…and rather prestigious for the whole genre. For once, several of the nominees are either on my TBR, currently being read or in one case, part of my shelved library.

In the Best First Novel by an American Author category, Ritu Mukerji’s Murder by Degrees is a prominent book. Set in Philadelphia of 1875, Dr. Lydia Weston is called upon to assist with a police investigation regarding the washed up body of a woman believed to have been one of her patients.

While she does suspect that the unfortunate victim was Anna Ward, who works as a  maid in the household of a rather influential family, Lydia is not certain of the circumstances that lead to her possible demise. Her social connections may make it easier for her to learn things that the police can’t yet Lydia risks a great deal here as her own position in society is precarious as well.

This is such a wonderful development for a new author and I am taking my time with this story as it’s too good to quickly devour. Instead, taking the time to enjoy the subtle nuances of the plot points and social class structures is truly rewarding:

A fun portion of the Edgar’s is the special categories dedicated to iconic authors such as Mary Higgins Clark and Sue Grafton. 

One of those sections is named for Lillian Jackson Braun(best known for her The Cat Who..mystery series) and I spotted a name very familiar to me amongst the nominees: Vivien Chien.

Chien’ cosy culinary themed mystery books, The Noodle Shop Mysteries, is a favorite of mine and seeing the most recent entry, Misfortune Cookie,get a nom here is so great!

The leading detective of these books is Lana Lee, who has found herself to be doing well as manager of her family’s restaurant near Cleveland , Ohio and in this installment, she takes a trip to California with her uptight sister Anna May  for both business and pleasure reasons.

While attending a restaurant convention, Lana witnesses a fight between a quirky reporter and a fortune cookie vendor that later leads to the reporter “accidentally “ falling to her death. 

As it turns out, the woman in question was a good friend of Lana’s Aunt Grace(who she and Anna May are staying with at the moment). Did this woman’s tragic demise have anything to do with that earlier argument or was that just the way the fateful cookie crumbled?

This is such an engaging series and a lively one at that, with a youthful main character surrounded by enough amusing family and friends to rival the likes of Stars Hollow itself. Really keeping my fingers crossed for this tasty mystery morsel to win:

While the Edgars do cover other areas such as YA, true crime and paperback originals, the one category that I wish I was more brushed up on is the Best Television Episode Screenplay section.

Most of the nominees there come from the Peacock series Poker Face(there’s one for ABC’s Will Trent and the AMC show Dark Winds), that stars Natasha Lyonne as Charlie Cale, whose uncanny ability to detect the truth makes her ideal for solving crimes but difficult when it comes to other things in life.

Since I don’t have a subscription to Peacock, this show is only known to me via the great reviews from critics and viewers alike. There’s no doubt in my mind that PF will win(and probably deserves to) my best guess for which episode gets that honor is “Dead Man’s Hand” written by Rian Johnson. He not only created this show(inspired by the classic Columbo) but has revived interest in the old school style of mystery sleuthing with his films Knives Out and its follow-up The Glass Onion.

Hopefully in the future, Peacock will be on my streaming lineup but until then, Poker Face should get the acclaim it deserves and I’m pleased to see such genre love be well rewarded:

Since the Edgars won’t be handed out until May 1st, there is plenty of time to catch up on the reading and I’m already underway with one of the Best Novel nominees, All The Sinners Bleed by S.A. Cosby, and plan to dive into another one soon after that, Bright Young Women by Jessica Knoll.

Congratulations to all of the nominated authors in all categories and may many more readers discover a new book or two , thanks to this list. In the meanwhile, I do recommend what I hope will be a future nominee in the TV category, Death and Other Details , currently airing on Hulu. 

Mandy Patinkin stars as former great sleuth Rufus Cotesworth who teams up with former client Imogene (Violett Beane) on a high seas murder case. So far, it’s a snappy salute to the closed room mystery with some fine performances and well worth your entertainment time, along with a couple of good books of course: