Agatha Award Winners

Truth Be Told
by Hank Phillippi Ryan

In digging up the facts on the heartbreaking story of a middle-class family evicted from their suburban home—and on other foreclosures—reporter Jane Ryland soon learns the truth behind a big-bucks scheme and the surprising players who will stop at nothing, including murder, to keep their goal a secret. By the author of The Wrong Girl.

2014 Agatha Award

The Wrong Girl
by Hank Phillippi Ryan

Investigating allegations against an adoption agency that is suspected of reuniting adopted children with the wrong birth parents, Jane Ryland finds her efforts suspiciously tied to Jake Brogan's case involving a young woman's brutal murder and the disappearance of a baby. By the Anthony Award-winning author ofThe Other Woman.

2013 Agatha Award

The Beautiful Mystery
by Louise Penny

When a peaceful monastery in Québec is shattered by the murder of their renowned choir director, Chief Inspector Armand Gamache and Jean-Guy Beauvoir try to find the killer in a cloistered community that has taken a vow of silence.

2012 Agatha Award

Three-Day Town
by Margaret Maron

While in New York celebrating their delayed honeymoon, Judge Deborah Knott and Sheriff's Deputy Dwight Bryant stumble upon a murdered doorman after agreeing to deliver a package to NYPD lieutenant and join the intended recipient in the investigation.

2011 Agatha Award

Bury Your Dead
by Louise Penny

Taking leave during Quebec's Winter Carnival after a case gone wrong, a disgruntled Chief Inspector Armand Gamache is unable to avoid assisting a politically-charged investigation involving a historian's murder during a search for a famous figure's burial site.

2010 Agatha Award

The Brutal Telling
by Louise Penny

Chaos is coming, old son. With those words the peace of Three Pines is shattered. As families prepare to head back to the city and children say goodbye to summer a stranger is found murdered in the village bistro and antiques store. Once again, Chief Inspector Gamache and his team are called in to strip back layers of lies - exposing both treasures and rancid secrets buried in the wilderness.

2009 Agatha Award

The Cruelest Month
by Louise Penny

When the charming, seemingly idyllic town of Three Pines is rocked by a killing during an impromptu Easter séance at a local haunted house, Chief Inspector Armand Gamache is confronted by a web of baffling questions as he searches for a killer.

2008 Agatha Awward

A Fatal Grace
by Louise Penny

Sent to tiny Three Pines, a village south of Montreal, to investigate the death of CC de Poitiers, an extremely unpopular woman apparently cooked alive in an apparent electrical accident during a local curling match, Armand Gamache of the Surete du Quebec finds that no one liked the victim and that nearly everyone in town had both a motive and opportunity to kill her.

2007 Agatha Award

The Virgin of Small Plains
by Nancy Pickard

Seventeen years after the discovery of an unidentified female murder victim, whose brutalized body is found outside Small Plains, Kansas, the young girl's grave has become the source of a series of strange miracles and legends, until the return of prodigal son Mitch Newquist, along with a devastating tornado, threatens to bring old secrets to light.

2006 Agatha Award

The Body in the Snowdrift
by Katherine Hall Page

Traveling to Vermont to attend her father-in-law's birthday, caterer Faith Fairchild stumbles upon the dead body of a local lawyer and wonders if his death was accidental or intentional, in a case that is complicated by the disappearance of a ski slope resort's star chef. By the author of The Body in the Attic.

2005 Agatha Award

Birds of a Feather
by Jacqueline Winspear

When Maisie Dobbs is hired to find the missing daughter of a wealthy grocery magnate, she discovers that three of the heiress's friends have died violently, leading her to investigate the connection between the disappearance and the murders.

2004 Agatha Award

Letter from Home
by Carolyn G. Hart

Working at the local newspaper during the summer of 1944, Gretchen Gilman investigates the mysterious death of Faye Tatum, found dead in her own living room, supposedly murdered by her husband, a World War II veteran.

2003 Agatha Award

You've Got Murder
by Donna Andrews

When Zack, a workaholic computer expert, suddenly disappears, his friend, Turing, a sentient artificial intelligence personality created by Zack, begins to suspect foul play and turns sleuth to find out what happened to her creator.

2002 Agatha Award

Murphy's Law
by Rhys Bowen

Fleeing a false accusation of murder in Ireland, Molly Murphy becomes involved in another murder case when the man who was harrassing her on the boat to America turns up dead also.

2001 Agatha Award

Storm Track
by Margaret Maron

When the embittered wife of a local attorney is found strangled in a motel by her own skimpy undergarments, Judge Deborah Knott searches for clues as a deadly hurricane bears down on the coastal town.

2000 Agatha Award

Best Novel