The Accident on the A35 longlisted for UK’s top crime fiction prize

Posted on April 16, 2018

Graeme Macrae Burnet’s latest novel, The Accident on the A35, has been longlisted for the Theakston’s Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year award 2018.

Perhaps surprisingly, it is the first time the author of His Bloody Project has been a finalist for a UK crime fiction prize.

Graeme said, “This is tremendously exciting news. I’m delighted that The Accident on the A35 has been recognised by such a prestigious prize as the Theakston, which is such a great champion of the rich variety of British crime writing.

“This feels like a coming of age as a crime writer.”

The Accident on the A35 is one of 18 titles selected by an academy of crime writing authors, agents, editors, reviewers, members of the Crime Writing Festival Programming Committee and representatives from T&R Theakston Ltd and WH Smith.

The shortlist of six titles will be made public on 27 May, with the winner announced at a special ceremony at the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival, Harrogate, on 19 July.

The Accident on the A35 is a psychological thriller that revisits the small French town of Saint-Louis, and the diffident Inspector Georges Gorski, who appeared in Graeme’s debut novel, the Simenon-influenced The Disappearance of Adèle Bedeau (Contraband, 2014).

His Bloody Project has sold in excess of 150,000 copies in the UK alone, and has been published around the world. As well as being shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize, it won the Saltire Society Fiction Book of the Year Award and was shortlisted for an LA Times Book Prize.