Mystery
Writers of America 2026 Edgar Allan Poe Awards, honouring the best in
mystery fiction, nonfiction and television published or produced in 2025.
BEST NOVEL
The Big Empty by Robert Crais (Penguin
Random House – G.P. Putnam’s Sons)
BEST FIRST NOVEL BY AN AMERICAN AUTHOR
Dead Money by Jakob Kerr (Penguin
Random House – Bantam Books)
BEST PAPERBACK ORIGINAL
The Backwater by Vikki Wakefield
(Sourcebooks – Poisoned Pen Press)
BEST FACT CRIME:
Murderland: Crime and Bloodlust
in the Time of Serial Killers by
Caroline Fraser (Penguin Random House – Penguin Press)
BEST CRITICAL/BIOGRAPHICAL
Edgar Allan Poe: A Life by Richard Kopley
(University of Virginia Press)
BEST SHORT STORY
“Julius Katz Draws a Straight
Flush,” Alfred
Hitchcock Mystery Magazine – September-October 2025 by Dave Zeltserman (Must
Read Books Publishing)
BEST JUVENILE
Blood in the Water by Tiffany D. Jackson
(Scholastic Press)
BEST YOUNG ADULT
Under the Same Stars by Libba Bray (Macmillan
Publishers – Farrar, Straus and Giroux BFYR)
BEST TELEVISION EPISODE TELEPLAY
“Pilot” – Paradise, Written by Dan
Fogelman (Hulu)
OTHER AWARDS
ROBERT L. FISH MEMORIAL AWARD – Endowed
by the family of Robert L. Fish. “How It Happened,” Ellery Queen
Mystery Magazine, July-August 2025 by Billie Kay Fern (Must Read Books
Publishing)
THE SIMON & SCHUSTER MARY HIGGINS CLARK
AWARD – Presented
on behalf of Simon & Schuster.
All This Could Be Yours by Hank Phillippi Ryan (Macmillan
Publishers – Minotaur Books)
THE G.P. PUTNAM’S SONS SUE GRAFTON MEMORIAL
AWARD – Presented on behalf of G.P. Putnam’s Sons.
Gone in the Night by Joanna Schaffhausen
(Macmillan Publishers – Minotaur Books)
THE LILIAN JACKSON BRAUN MEMORIAL AWARD – Endowed by the estate of Lilian
Jackson Braun.
A Senior Citizen’s Guide to Life on the Run by Gwen Florio (Severn
House)
SPECIAL AWARDS -- PREVIOUSLY ANNOUNCED ON
JANUARY 13, 2026
GRAND MASTER
Donna Andrews
Lee Child
RAVEN AWARD
Book Passage, Corte Madera CA
ELLERY QUEEN AWARD
John Scognamiglio, Kensington
Books