Deadly Pleasures Mystery Magazine · award year

Barry Awards 2016

The 2016 Barry Awards went to The Unquiet Dead by Ausma Zehanat Khan (Best First Mystery/Crime Novel), Badlands by C.J. Box (Best Mystery/Crime Novel) and The Long and Faraway Gone by Lou Berney (Best Paperback Original Mystery/Crime Novel), with winners in 1 more category. 24 books were nominated across 4 categories.

Winners

Best First Mystery/Crime Novel

  1. The Unquiet Deadsource (opens in a new tab)

Best Mystery/Crime Novel

  1. Badlandssource (opens in a new tab)

Best Paperback Original Mystery/Crime Novel

  1. The Long and Faraway Gonesource (opens in a new tab)

Best Thriller

  1. The Masksource (opens in a new tab)

Nominees

Best First Mystery/Crime Novel

  1. Bull Mountainsource (opens in a new tab)
  2. Jade Dragon Mountainsource (opens in a new tab)
  3. Past Crimessource (opens in a new tab)
  4. Ruins of Warsource (opens in a new tab)
  5. The Girl on the Trainsource (opens in a new tab)

Best Mystery/Crime Novel

  1. A Song of Shadowssource (opens in a new tab)
  2. Devil of Delphisource (opens in a new tab)
  3. Life or Deathsource (opens in a new tab)
  4. The Cartelsource (opens in a new tab)
  5. The Stolen Onessource (opens in a new tab)

Best Paperback Original Mystery/Crime Novel

  1. Blessed Are Those Who Weepsource (opens in a new tab)
  2. No Other Darknesssource (opens in a new tab)
  3. Quarry's Choicesource (opens in a new tab)
  4. Snowblindsource (opens in a new tab)
  5. Stone Cold Deadsource (opens in a new tab)

Best Thriller

  1. Brute Forcesource (opens in a new tab)
  2. Foreign and Domesticsource (opens in a new tab)
  3. Hostage Takersource (opens in a new tab)
  4. The Killing Kindsource (opens in a new tab)
  5. Viking Baysource (opens in a new tab)

About the Barry Awards

Barry Awards, voted by readers of Deadly Pleasures Mystery Magazine and presented at Bouchercon. Year is the year presented at Bouchercon; books were published the prior year. Primary source is Deadly Pleasures' own Barry Awards page, cited via the archive.org snapshot of 13 Sep 2026 because the live page is http only. Title casing comes from Stop You're Killing Me, since Deadly Pleasures prints titles in capitals; Wikipedia was a second cross-check. Kept: Best Novel, Best First Novel, Best Paperback Original, Best Thriller (Best Action Thriller in 2025), Best British Crime Novel (2006-2012), and Best Mystery/Crime Novel of the Decade (2010, 2020). Category names follow Deadly Pleasures' label for each year. Dropped: Best Short Story and the Don Sandstrom fan award. 2013 dropped British and Short Story; 2023 had no Paperback Original category. Where US and UK titles differ, the first-listed (US) title is used. Repairs: 2024 Best Thriller winner is The Secret Hours per Deadly Pleasures (SYKM marks Going Zero); 2020 Novel of the Decade nominee is The Cartel per Deadly Pleasures (SYKM and Wikipedia list The Border); obvious spelling slips on the Deadly Pleasures page (e.g. If the Dead Not Rise, Fever at the Bone, Who Is Maude Dixon?) use the published titles.

Organization: Deadly Pleasures Mystery Magazine. Years are award years, which can differ from publication years. Official site (opens in a new tab)

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