# Dilys Award

The Dilys Award was presented every year from 1992 to 2014 by the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association. It was given to the mystery title of the year which the member booksellers have most enjoyed selling. The Independent Mystery Booksellers Association is an association of retail businesses that are either wholly or substantially devoted to the sale of mystery books. The Dilys award is named after Dilys Winn, who became the first specialty bookseller of mystery books in the United States.

## Awards

Award winners and finalists :
| Year | Author | Title | Result |
| 1992 | Carl Hiaasen | Native Tongue | Winner |
| 1992 | Elizabeth George | A Suitable Vengeance | Finalist |
| 1992 | Stephen Greenleaf | Book Case | Finalist |
| 1992 | J.A. Jance | Hour of the Hunter | Finalist |
| 1992 | Valerie Wolzien | We Wish You A Merry Murder | Finalist |
| 1993 | John Dunning | Booked to Die | Winner |
| 1993 | Michael Connelly | The Black Echo | Finalist |
| 1993 | Margaret Maron | Bootlegger's Daughter | Finalist |
| 1993 | Minette Walters | The Ice House | Finalist |
| 1994 | Peter Høeg | Smilla's Sense of Snow | Winner |
| 1994 | Marcia Muller | Wolf in the Shadows | Finalist |
| 1994 | Sharan Newman | Death Comes As Epiphany | Finalist |
| 1994 | Sandra West Prowell | By Evil Means | Finalist |
| 1994 | Steven Saylor | Catilina's Riddle | Finalist |
| 1994 | Minette Walters | The Sculptress | Finalist |
| 1994 | Don Winslow | Way Down on the High Lonely | Finalist |
| 1995 | Janet Evanovich | One for the Money | Winner |
| 1995 | Jeff Abbott | Do Unto Others | Finalist |
| 1995 | Nancy Atherton | Aunt Dimity and the Duke | Finalist |
| 1995 | Nevada Barr | A Superior Death | Finalist |
| 1995 | Michael Connelly | The Concrete Blonde | Finalist |
| 1995 | Carol O'Connell | Mallory's Oracle | Finalist |
| 1995 | Susan Wade | Walking Rain | Finalist |
| 1996 | Michael Connelly | The Last Coyote | Winner |
| 1996 | Robert Crais | Voodoo River | Finalist |
| 1996 | G. M. Ford | Who in Hell is Wanda Fuca? | Finalist |
| 1996 | Sharyn McCrumb | If I'd Killed Him When I Met Him | Finalist |
| 1996 | Tom Topor | The Codicil | Finalist |
| 1997 | Michael Connelly | The Poet | Winner |
| 1997 | Harlan Coben | Fade Away | Finalist |
| 1997 | Margaret Lawrence | Hearts and Bones | Finalist |
| 1997 | Dennis Lehane | Darkness, Take My Hand | Finalist |
| 1997 | Michael McGarrity | Tularosa | Finalist |
| 1997 | Steve Oliver | Moody Gets the Blues | Finalist |
| 1997 | Thomas Perry | Dance for the Dead | Finalist |
| 1997 | Charles Todd | A Test of Wills | Finalist |
| 1998 | Janet Evanovich | Three to Get Deadly | Winner |
| 1998 | Lee Child | Killing Floor | Finalist |
| 1998 | Harlan Coben | Back Spin | Finalist |
| 1998 | Dennis Lehane | Sacred | Finalist |
| 1998 | Kathy Reichs | Déjà Dead | Finalist |
| 1998 | Kate Ross | The Devil in Music | Finalist |
| 1999 | Dennis Lehane | Gone, Baby, Gone | Winner |
| 1999 | Nevada Barr | Blind Descent | Finalist |
| 1999 | Richard Barre | The Ghosts of Morning | Finalist |
| 1999 | James Lee Burke | Sunset Limited | Finalist |
| 1999 | William Kent Krueger | Iron Lake | Finalist |
| 1999 | Charles Todd | Wings of Fire | Finalist |
| 2000 | Robert Crais | L.A. Requiem | Winner |
| 2000 | Rennie Airth | River of Darkness | Finalist |
| 2000 | Donna Andrews | Murder with Peacocks | Finalist |
| 2000 | William Kent Krueger | Boundary Waters | Finalist |
| 2000 | Don Winslow | California Fire and Life | Finalist |
| 2001 | Val McDermid | A Place of Execution | Winner |
| 2001 | Sarah Caudwell | The Sibyl in Her Grave | Finalist |
| 2001 | Tim Cockey | The Hearse You Came in On | Finalist |
| 2001 | Robert Crais | Demolition Angel | Finalist |
| 2001 | Janet Evanovich | Hot Six | Finalist |
| 2002 | Dennis Lehane | Mystic River | Winner |
| 2002 | David Handler | The Cold Blue Blood | Finalist |
| 2002 | Charlaine Harris | Dead Until Dark | Finalist |
| 2002 | William Kent Krueger | Purgatory Ridge | Finalist |
| 2002 | Peter Lovesey | The Reaper | Finalist |
| 2003 | Julia Spencer-Fleming | In the Bleak Midwinter | Winner |
| 2003 | Donna Andrews | You've Got Murder | Finalist |
| 2003 | Lee Child | Without Fail | Finalist |
| 2003 | Jasper Fforde | The Eyre Affair | Finalist |
| 2003 | George Pelecanos | Hell to Pay | Finalist |
| 2004 | Jasper Fforde | Lost in a Good Book | Winner |
| 2004 | Donna Andrews | Crouching Buzzard, Leaping Loon | Finalist |
| 2004 | William Brodrick | The Sixth Lamentation | Finalist |
| 2004 | P. J. Tracy | Monkeewrench | Finalist |
| 2004 | Jacqueline Winspear | Maisie Dobbs | Finalist |
| 2005 | Jeff Lindsay | Darkly Dreaming Dexter | Winner |
| 2005 | Lee Child | The Enemy | Finalist |
| 2005 | Jasper Fforde | Something Rotten | Finalist |
| 2005 | Leslie Silbert | The Intelligencer | Finalist |
| 2005 | Jacqueline Winspear | Birds of a Feather | Finalist |
| 2005 | Carlos Ruiz Zafon | The Shadow of the Wind | Finalist |
| 2006 | Colin Cotterill | Thirty-Three Teeth | Winner |
| 2006 | Terence Faherty | In a Teapot | Finalist |
| 2006 | Craig Johnson | The Cold Dish | Finalist |
| 2006 | Morag Joss | Half Broken Things | Finalist |
| 2006 | Mark Schweitzer | The Tenor Wore Tapshoes | Finalist |
| 2006 | Don Winslow | The Power of the Dog | Finalist |
| 2007 | Louise Penny | Still Life | Winner |
| 2007 | James R. Benn | Billy Boyle | Finalist |
| 2007 | Steve Hockensmith | Holmes on the Range | Finalist |
| 2007 | John J. Lamb | Mournful Teddy | Finalist |
| 2007 | Nancy Pickard | The Virgin of the Small Plains | Finalist |
| 2007 | Diane Setterfield | The Thirteenth Tale | Finalist |
| 2008 | William Kent Krueger | Thunder Bay | Winner |
| 2008 | Rhys Bowen | Her Royal Spyness | Finalist |
| 2008 | Lisa Lutz | The Spellman Files | Finalist |
| 2008 | Deanna Raybourn | Silent in the Grave | Finalist |
| 2008 | Marcus Sakey | The Blade Itself | Finalist |
| 2009 | Sean Chercover | Trigger City | Winner |
| 2009 | Christopher Fowler | The Victoria Vanishes | Finalist |
| 2009 | Deanna Raybourn | Silent in the Sanctuary | Finalist |
| 2009 | Tom Rob Smith | Child 44 | Finalist |
| 2009 | Don Winslow | Dawn Patrol | Finalist |
| 2010 | Alan Bradley | The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie | Winner |
| 2010 | R. J. Ellory | A Quiet Belief in Angels | Finalist |
| 2010 | Craig Johnson | The Dark Horse | Finalist |
| 2010 | Stieg Larsson | The Girl Who Played with Fire | Finalist |
| 2010 | Stuart Neville | The Ghosts of Belfast | Finalist |
| 2010 | Louise Penny | The Brutal Telling | Finalist |
| 2010 | S. J. Rozan | The Shanghai Moon | Finalist |
| 2011 | Louise Penny | Bury Your Dead | Winner |
| 2011 | Colin Cotterill | Love Songs from a Shallow Grave | Finalist |
| 2011 | Steve Hamilton | The Lock Artist | Finalist |
| 2011 | Dennis Lehane | Moonlight Mile | Finalist |
| 2011 | Keith Thomson | Once a Spy | Finalist |
| 2011 | Don Winslow | Savages | Finalist |
| 2012 | S. J. Rozan | Ghost Hero | Winner |
| 2012 | Tim Dorsey | When Elves Attack | Finalist |
| 2012 | G. M. Malliet | Wicked Autumn | Finalist |
| 2012 | Archer Mayor | Tag Man | Finalist |
| 2012 | Louise Penny | A Trick of the Light | Finalist |
| 2013 | Peter Robinson | Before the Poison | Winner |
| 2013 | Colin Cotterill | Grandad, There's a Head on the Beach | Finalist |
| 2013 | Tana French | Broken Harbor | Finalist |
| 2013 | Susan Elia MacNeal | Mr. Churchill's Secretary | Finalist |
| 2013 | Chris Pavone | The Expats | Finalist |
| 2014 | William Kent Krueger | Ordinary Grace | Winner |
| 2014 | Lyndsay Faye | Seven for a Secret | Finalist |
| 2014 | Alex Grecian | The Black Country | Finalist |
| 2014 | Anne Hillerman | Spider Woman's Daughter | Finalist |
| 2014 | G. M. Malliet | Pagan Spring | Finalist |
| 2014 | Vidar Sundstol | The Land of Dreams | Finalist |