CWA shortlists shortened for its Gold Dagger, Ian Fleming Dagger and John Creasey Dagger Awards

And then there were four. The shortlists of nominees for the Crime Writers Association's (CWA's) Gold Dagger Award, its Ian Fleming Steel Dagger Award and its John Creasey New Blood Dagger are now even shorter with only four nominees now for each of the three awards.

Karen Campbell's Shadowplay, from her Anna Cameron
series, is one of the remaining contenders for the CWA
Gold Dagger Award.

ITV, the British television network that will announce the winners of these awards during the Fall 2010 broadcast of the "Specsavers Crime Thriller Awards" on October 12, 2010, has published the newly condensed list on its website. The longer version of the shortlist had been issued July 23rd during the Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival in Harrogate, England.

The current nominees for the CWA's Gold Dagger for the Best Crime Novel are  Blacklands by Belinda Bauer,  Blood Harvest by S.J. Bolton, Shadowplay (Anna Cameron series, book 3) by Karen Campbell and The Way Home by George Pelecanos.

Nominees for the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger for the Best Thriller of the Year now include A Loyal Spy by Simon Conway, The Dying Light by Henry Porter, Innocent (Kindle County series, book 7) by Scott Turow and The Gentlemen’s Hour by Don Winslow.

Remaining nominees for the CWA John Creasey (New Blood) Dagger for the Best New Crime Writer of the Year are Acts of Violence by Ryan David Jahn, The Pull of the Moon by Diane Janes, Rupture by Simon Lelic and The Holy Thief by William Ryan.

That's the list, as it now stands.The Mystery Series Examiner promises to stay tuned for any further shortenings of the shortened shortlist and relay them promply.