# Theakston's Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award

The Theakston's Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award is one of the UK's top crime-fiction awards, sponsored by Theakston's Old Peculier. It is awarded annually at Harrogate Crime Writing Festival in the UK, held every July, as part of the Harrogate International Festivals. The winner receives £3000 and a small hand-carved oak beer cask carved by one of Britain's last coopers. Novels eligible are those crime novels published in paperback any time during the previous year. Voting is by the public with decisions of a jury-panel also taken into account, a fact not-much publicised by the award organisers, who are keen to emphasize the public-voting aspect of the award.

## Recipients

Award winners and nominees :
| Year | Author | Title | Result |
| 2005 | Mark Billingham | Lazybones | Winner |
| 2005 | Andrew Taylor | The American Boy | Shortlist |
| 2005 | Val McDermid | The Distant Echo | Shortlist |
| 2005 | Simon Kernick | The Murder Exchange | Shortlist |
| 2005 | Ian Rankin | A Question of Blood | Shortlist |
| 2005 | Minette Walters | Disordered Minds | Shortlist |
| 2006 | Val McDermid | The Torment of Others | Winner |
| 2006 | Martin Edwards | The Coffin Trail | Shortlist |
| 2006 | Susan Hill | The Various Haunts of Men | Shortlist |
| 2006 | Ian Rankin | Fleshmarket Close | Shortlist |
| 2006 | Stephen Booth | One Last Breath | Shortlist |
| 2006 | Lindsay Ashford | Strange Blood | Shortlist |
| 2007 | Allan Guthrie | Two-Way Split | Winner |
| 2007 | Stephen Booth | The Dead Place | Shortlist |
| 2007 | Michael Jecks | The Death Ship of Dartmouth | Shortlist |
| 2007 | Christopher Brookmyre | All Fun and Games Until Somebody Loses an Eye | Shortlist |
| 2007 | Graham Hurley | Blood and Honey | Shortlist |
| 2007 | Stuart MacBride | Cold Granite | Shortlist |
| 2008 | Stef Penney | The Tenderness of Wolves | Winner |
| 2008 | Alexander McCall Smith | Blue Shoes and Happiness | Shortlist |
| 2008 | Mark Billingham | Buried | Shortlist |
| 2008 | Stuart MacBride | Dying Light | Shortlist |
| 2008 | Peter James | Not Dead Enough | Shortlist |
| 2008 | Graham Hurley | One Under | Shortlist |
| 2008 | Peter Robinson | Piece of My Heart | Shortlist |
| 2008 | Simon Kernick | Relentless | Shortlist |
| 2008 | C.J. Sansom | Sovereign | Shortlist |
| 2008 | Simon Beckett | The Chemistry of Death | Shortlist |
| 2008 | Reginald Hill | The Death of Dalzeil | Shortlist |
| 2008 | Christopher Brookmyre | A Tale Etched in Blood and Hard Black Pencil | Shortlist |
| 2009 | Mark Billingham | Death Message | Winner |
| 2009 | Tom Cain | The Accident Man | Shortlist |
| 2009 | Declan Hughes | The Colour of Blood | Shortlist |
| 2009 | Reginald Hill | A Cure for All Diseases | Shortlist |
| 2009 | Lee Child | Bad Luck and Trouble | Shortlist |
| 2009 | Val McDermid | Beneath the Bleeding | Shortlist |
| 2009 | Stuart MacBride | Broken Skin | Shortlist |
| 2009 | Peter James | Dead Man's Footsteps | Shortlist |
| 2009 | Ian Rankin | Exit Music | Shortlist |
| 2009 | Peter Robinson | Friend of the Devil | Shortlist |
| 2009 | David Hewson | Garden of Evil | Shortlist |
| 2009 | John Harvey | Gone to Ground | Shortlist |
| 2009 | Mo Hayder | Ritual | Shortlist |
| 2009 | Chris Simms | Savage Moon | Shortlist |
| 2010 | R. J. Ellory | A Simple Act of Violence | Winner |
| 2010 | Elly Griffiths | The Crossing Places | Shortlist |
| 2010 | Tania Carver | The Surrogate | Shortlist |
| 2010 | Tom Rob Smith | Child 44 | Shortlist |
| 2010 | Peter James | Dead Tomorrow | Shortlist |
| 2010 | Ian Rankin | Doors Open | Shortlist |
| 2010 | Brian McGilloway | Gallows Lane | Shortlist |
| 2010 | Mark Billingham | In the Dark | Shortlist |
| 2011 | Lee Child | 61 Hours | Winner |
| 2011 | Andrew Taylor | The Anatomy of Ghosts | Shortlist |
| 2011 | William Ryan | The Holy Thief | Shortlist |
| 2011 | S. J. Bolton | Blood Harvest | Shortlist |
| 2011 | Stuart MacBride | Dark Blood | Shortlist |
| 2011 | Mark Billingham | From the Dead | Shortlist |
| 2012 | Denise Mina | The End of the Wasp Season | Winner |
| 2012 | John Connolly | The Burning Soul | Shortlist |
| 2012 | S. J. Watson | Before I Go to Sleep | Shortlist |
| 2012 | Steve Mosby | Black Flowers | Shortlist |
| 2012 | S. J. Bolton | Now You See Me | Shortlist |
| 2012 | Christopher Brookmyre | Where the Bodies are Buried | Shortlist |
| 2013 | Denise Mina | Gods and Beasts | Winner |
| 2013 | Stav Sherez | A Dark Redemption | Shortlist |
| 2013 | Peter May | The Lewis Man | Shortlist |
| 2013 | Mark Billingham | Rush of Blood | Shortlist |
| 2013 | Chris Ewan | Safe House | Shortlist |
| 2013 | Stuart Neville | Stolen Souls | Shortlist |
| 2014 | Belinda Bauer | Rubbernecker | Winner |
| 2014 | Peter May | The Chess Men | Shortlist |
| 2014 | Denise Mina | The Red Road | Shortlist |
| 2014 | Malcolm Mackay | Death of Lewis Winter | Shortlist |
| 2014 | Elly Griffiths | Dying Fall | Shortlist |
| 2014 | Stav Sherez | Eleven Days | Shortlist |
| 2015 | Sarah Hilary | Someone Else's Skin | Winner |
| 2015 | Ray Celestin | The Axeman’s Jazz | Shortlist |
| 2015 | Antonia Hodgson | The Devil in the Marshalsea | Shortlist |
| 2015 | Belinda Bauer | The Facts of Life and Death | Shortlist |
| 2015 | Elly Griffiths | The Outcast Dead | Shortlist |
| 2015 | Peter May | Entry Island | Shortlist |
| 2016 | Clare Mackintosh | I Let You Go | Winner |
| 2016 | Robert Galbraith | Career of Evil | Shortlist |
| 2016 | Renee Knight | Disclaimer | Shortlist |
| 2016 | Adrian McKinty | Rain Dogs | Shortlist |
| 2016 | Eva Dolan | Tell No Tales | Shortlist |
| 2016 | Mark Billingham | Time of Death | Shortlist |
| 2017 | Christopher Brookmyre | Black Widow | Winner |
| 2017 | Eva Dolan | After You Die | Shortlist |
| 2017 | Sabine Durrant | Lie with Me | Shortlist |
| 2017 | Susie Steiner | Missing, Presumed | Shortlist |
| 2017 | Val McDermid | Out of Bounds | Shortlist |
| 2017 | Mick Herron | Real Tigers | Shortlist |
| 2018 | Stav Sherez | The Intrusions | Winner |
| 2018 | Denise Mina | The Long Drop | Shortlist |
| 2018 | Abir Mukherjee | A Rising Man | Shortlist |
| 2018 | Val McDermid | Insidious Intent | Shortlist |
| 2018 | Susie Steiner | Persons Unknown | Shortlist |
| 2018 | Mick Herron | Spook Street | Shortlist |
| 2019 | Steve Cavanagh | Thirteen | Winner |
| 2019 | Liam McIlvanney | The Quaker | Shortlist |
| 2019 | Val McDermid | Broken Ground | Shortlist |
| 2019 | Khurrum Rahman | East of Hounslow | Shortlist |
| 2019 | Mick Herron | London Rules | Shortlist |
| 2019 | Belinda Bauer | Snap | Shortlist |
| 2020 | Adrian McKinty | The Chain | Winner |
| 2020 | Jane Harper | The Lost Man | Shortlist |
| 2020 | Mick Herron | Joe Country | Shortlist |
| 2020 | Oyinkan Braithwaite | My Sister, the Serial Killer | Shortlist |
| 2020 | Abir Mukherjee | Smoke and Ashes | Shortlist |
| 2020 | Helen Fitzgerald | Worst Case Scenario | Shortlist |
| 2021 | Chris Whitaker | We Begin at the End | Winner |
| 2021 | Elly Griffiths | The Lantern Men | Shortlist |
| 2021 | Brian McGilloway | The Last Crossing | Shortlist |
| 2021 | Trevor Wood | The Man on the Street | Shortlist |
| 2021 | Rosamund Lupton | The Three Hours | Shortlist |
| 2021 | Abir Mukherjee | Death in the East | Shortlist |
| 2022 | Mick Herron | Slough House | Winner |
| 2022 | Laura Shepherd-Robinson | Daughters of Night | Shortlist |
| 2022 | Vaseem Khan | Midnight at Malabar House | Shortlist |
| 2022 | Will Dean | The Last Thing to Burn | Shortlist |
| 2022 | Elly Griffiths | The Night Hawks | Shortlist |
| 2022 | Joseph Knox | True Crime Story | Shortlist |
| 2023 | M. W. Craven | The Botanist | Winner |
| 2023 | Fiona Cummins | Into the Dark | Shortlist |
| 2023 | Elly Griffiths | The Locked Room | Shortlist |
| 2023 | Doug Johnstone | Black Hearts | Shortlist |
| 2023 | Gillian McAllister | Wrong Place, Wrong time | Shortlist |
| 2023 | Ruth Ware | The IT Girl | Shortlist |

## Outstanding Contribution

| Year | Author | Result | Ref. |
| 2022 | Michael Connelly | Selected | |
| 2023 | Ann Cleeves | Selected | |