Annal:1995 Agatha Award for Best First Novel
From AwardAnnals
Results of the Agatha Award in the year 1995. For a ranked list of books, try an honor roll:
The Body in the Transept: A Dorothy Martin Mystery
- 1995 Agatha–1st Novel winner
- Score: 10.45
In the finest tradition of the classic British mystery, The Body in the Transept introduces a charming amateur sleuth and lover of outrageous hats, all the secrets and eccentricities of a small town, and a cast of characters whose company will be the pleasure of mystery readers everywhere. For Dorothy Martin, widowed American removed to the England she so loves, the Christmas service is painful enough. It is her first holiday without Frank. And stumbling over the body of Canon Billings does nothing to improve her mood. Of course, she does get to meet Chief…
- 1996 Anthony-1st Novel winner
- 1995 Agatha–1st Novel nominee
- Score: 16.46
Jo Beth Siddon is a bloodhound trainer with a special talent for harrowing search-and-rescue missions, and a bad habit for mouthing off to deputies who refuse to take orders from a woman.She has seen her share of trouble: moonshiners poking guns at her head, crooked cops, and an abusive ex-husband with a terrible temper. Then she’s suspected of murder and finds herself treading a quagmire as thick and treacherous as the Okefenokee Swamp. If she can’t prove her innocence, she might lose not only the thriving business she loves, but the freedom and independence she’s fought for all her life.
Horse of a Different Killer: A Mystery Novel
- 1995 Agatha–1st Novel nominee
- Score: 6.45
When a quarter-million-dollar show horse and a top trainer are found brutally murdered side by side, Natalie Gold, a reporter for the Charlotte Commercial Appeal, seizes the chance to get off the fashion beat she so detests. Though Henry Goode is the paper’s star investigative reporter, it’s Nattie who knows the rich, competitive, and devious world of the show horse circuit. After all, she scrimped and saved to buy her own hunter, Brenda Starr. Moving between the emerald green paddocks of the Southern gentry and the raunchy newsroom of Charlotte’s bustling daily,…
- 1995 Agatha–1st Novel nominee
- Score: 6.45
The crime scene showed that a cunning mind and a passionate hatred lay behind the killing of Lisa Stillwell. But New Scotland Yard would not have been called to this remote Hampshire village if the baby-sitter’s employer hadn’t been Gale Grayson, a self-exiled American with a suspicious past. Three years before, Chief Inspector Daniel Halford had watched helplessly as Gale’s husband put a gun in his mouth and pulled the trigger —seconds before Halford could arrest him for terrorism. Halford has never forgotten the scene or the pregnant young widow…
Murder In Scorpio: An Elizabeth Chase Mystery
- 1996 Edgar-1st Novel nominee
- 1995 Agatha–1st Novel nominee
- Score: 12.46
She’s a California P.I. with something extra-an instinct for trouble and a special sense of danger.
Elizabeth Chase is used to funny looks and disbelief when she tells people she uses the paranormal and astrology to help her investigations. But when Sergeant Tom McGowan of the Escondido Police Department needs help in exploring the not-so-accidental death of an old friend, he turns to her.
Instantly, Elizabeth is absorbed by the case, and searches the stars and her sensitive psyche for answers. Janic Freeman, the dead woman, had a lot of friends, but as…
