Crime Novel of the Year

The award celebrates excellence, originality, and the very best in crime fiction from UK and Irish authors. A highlight in the literary calendar, past winners include Denise Mina, Steve Cavanagh, Val McDermid and Chris Brookmyre. Awarded annually as part of Harrogate International Festivals’ Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival, the winner of the most wanted accolade in crime fiction receives a cheque for £3000, and an engraved oak beer cask, hand-carved by one of Britain’s last coopers from Theakstons Brewery.

WINNER 2025

Hunted

Mukherjee, Abir ISBN: 9781529933529
Paperback / softback

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YOU CAN'T SAVE YOUR KIDS...BUT CAN YOU STOP THEM?

It’s a week before the presidential elections when a bomb goes off in an LA shopping mall…In London, armed police storm Heathrow Airport and arrest Sajid Khan. His daughter Aliyah entered the USA with the suicide bomber, and now she’s missing, potentially plotting another attack. But then a mysterious woman called Carrie turns up at Sajid’s door after travelling halfway across the world. She claims Aliyah is with her son Greg, and she knows where they could be. Back in the US, Agent Shreya Mistry is closing in on the two fugitives. But the more she investigates, the more she realises this case is far from as simple as it seems. Hunted by the authorities, the two parents are thrown together in a race against time to find their kids before the FBI does and stop a catastrophe that will bring the world to its knees.

- Browns Books Synopsis

The Theakston's Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award is one of the UK's top crime-fiction awards, sponsored by Theakston's Old Peculier. It is awarded annually at Harrogate Crime Writing Festival in the UK, held every July, as part of the Harrogate International Festivals.