Ned Kelly Awards

The Ned Kelly Awards (named for bushranger Ned Kelly) are Australia's leading literary awards for crime writing in both the crime fiction and true crime genres. They were established in 1996 by the Crime Writers Association of Australia to reward excellence in the field of crime writing within Australia.

The genre of crime writing has long been popular, but it was not until the early 1990s that a local growth of writing within the genre occurred in Australia. By the middle of the decade support for the field had grown sufficiently that it was decided to establish the Ned Kelly Awards.

The awards are affectionately referred to as 'The Neddies' within the community.

Categories

*Best First Novel
*Best True Crime
*Best Novel
*Best Teenage/Young Adult
*Readers Vote
*Best Non-Fiction
*Lifetime Achievement Awards

Winners

Shortlists

;2021

Best Crime Novel

* Garry Disher, ''Consolation''
* Candice Fox, ''Gathering Dark''
* Sulari Gentill, ''A Testament of Character''
* Jane Harper, ''The Survivors''
* Dervla McTiernan, ''The Good Turn''
* J P Pomare, ''Tell Me Lies''
* Michael Robotham, ''When She Was Good''
* Sarah Thornton, ''White Throat''

Best Debut Crime Novel

* Rae Cairns, ''The Good Mother''
* Lorraine Peck, ''The Second Son''
* Kyle Perry, ''The Bluffs''
* Greg Woodlands, ''The Night Whistler''

Best true crime

* Tanya Bretherton, ''The Husband Poisoner''
* Bret Christian, ''Stalking Claremont: Inside the hunt for a serial killer''
* Mark Dapin, ''Public Enemies''
* Tom Doig, ''Hazelwood''
* Louise Milligan, ''Witness''

Best international crime fiction

* Lucy Foley, ''The Guest List''
* Charity Norman, ''The Secrets of Strangers''
* Sara Sligar, ''Take Me Apart''
* Chris Whittaker, ''We Begin at the End''
* Don Winslow, ''Broken''

;2020

Best Crime Novel

* Nick Gadd, ''Death of a Typographer''
* Dave Warner, ''River of Salt''
* Dervla McTiernan, ''The Scholar''
* Pip Drysdale, ''The Strangers We Know''
* David Whish-Wilson, ''True West''
* Christian White, ''The Wife and the Widow''

Best First Crime Novel

* Susan Hurley, ''Eight Lives''
* Sarah Thornton, ''Lapse''
* R W R McDonald, ''The Nancys''
* Natalie Conyer, ''Present Tense''
* Petronella McGovern, ''Six Minutes''
* Karina Kilmore, ''Where the Truth Lies''

Best True Crime

* Dan Box, ''Bowraville''
* Kate McClymont, ''Dead Man Walking: The murky world of Michael McGurk and Ron Medich''
* Phillip Roope and Kevin Meagher, ''Shark Arm''
* Angela Williams, ''Snakes and Ladders''

;2019

Best Crime Novel
* Garry Disher, ''Kill Shot: A Wyatt Thriller''
* Candice Fox, ''Gone by Midnight''
* Kerry Greenwood, ''The Spotted Dog''
* Jane Harper, ''The Lost Man''
* Michael Robotham, ''The Other Wife''
* Sue Williams, ''Live and Let Fry''

Best First Crime Novel
* Katherine Kovacic, ''The Portrait of Molly Dean''
* Dervla McTiernan, ''The Ruin''
* Emily O'Grady, ''The Yellow House''
* Ben Stevenson, ''Greenlight''

Best True Crime
* Chloe Hooper, ''The Arsonist''
* Bri Lee, ''Eggshell Skull''
* Deborah Snow, ''Siege: Inside the Lindt Cafe''
* Kate Wild, ''Waiting for Elijah''

;
;2018

Best Crime Novel
* Alan Carter, ''Marlborough Man''
* Garry Disher, ''Under Cold Bright Lights''
* Candice Fox, ''Redemption Point''
* Sulari Gentill, ''Crossing the Lines''
* Anna George, ''The Lone Child''
* Iain Ryan, ''The Student''

Best First Crime Novel
* Mark Brandi, ''Wimmera''
* Sarah Bailey, ''The Dark Lake''
* Megan Goldin, ''The Girl in Keller’s Way''
* Sarah Schmidt, ''See What I Have Done''

Best True Crime
* Mark Abernethy, ''The Contractor''
* Graham Archer, ''Unmaking A Murder: The Mysterious Death of Anna Jane Cheney''
* Tanya Bretherton, ''The Suitcase Baby''
* Campbell McConachie, ''The Fatalist''
* Gabriella Coslovich, ''Whiteley on Trial''

;
;2017

Best Crime Novel
* Emily Maguire, ''An Isolated Incident''
* Candice Fox, ''Crimson Lake''
* Ann Turner, ''Out of the Ice''
* Adrian McKinty, ''Police at the Station and They Don't Look Friendly''
* Wendy James, ''The Golden Child''
* Jock Serong, ''The Rules of Backyard Cricket''

Best First Crime Novel
* Ron Elliott, ''Burn Patterns''
* Holly Throsby, ''Goodwood''
* Anna Snoekstra, ''Only Daughter''
* Andy Muir, ''Something for Nothing''
* Jane Harper, ''The Dry''
* Laura Elizabeth Woollett, ''The Love of a Bad Man''

Best True Crime
* Colin Dillon, with Tom Gilling, ''Code of Silence''
* Terry Smyth, ''Denny Day''
* Duncan McNab, ''Getting Away with Murder''
* Mark Tedeschi, ''Murder at Myall Creek''
* Duncan McNab, ''Roger Rogerson''
* Brendan James Murray, ''The Drowned Man''
;
;2016
Best Crime Novel
* Mark Dapin, ''R&R''
* Garry Disher, ''The Heat''
* Candice Fox, ''Fall''
* Adrian McKinty, ''Rain Dogs''
* Barry Maitland, ''Ash Island''
* Dave Warner, '' Before It Breaks''

Best First Crime Novel
* Tania Chandler, ''Please Don't Leave Me Here''
* J. M. Green, ''Good Money''
* Mark Hollands, ''Amplify''
* Gary Kemble, ''Skin Deep''
* Iain Ryan, ''Four Days''
*Emma Viskic, ''Resurrection Bay''

Best True Crime
* Gideon Haigh, ''Certain Admissions''
* Kate Kyriacou, ''The Sting''
* Martin Mckenzie-Murray, ''A Murder Without Motive''
* Rebecca Poulson, ''Killing love''
* Mark Tedeschi, ''Kidnapped''

;2015
Best Crime Novel
* Peter Docker, ''Sweet One''
* Candice Fox, '' Eden''
* Sulari Gentill, ''A Murder Unmentioned''
* Barry Maitland, ''Crucifixion Creek''
* Adrian McKinty, ''Gun Street Girl''
* Malla Nunn, ''Present Darkness''

Best First Crime Novel
* Nigel Bartlett, ''King of the Road''
* Anna George, ''What Came Before''
* Nicholas J Johnson, ''Chasing the Ace''
* Jock Serong, ''Quota''

Best True Crime
* Amy Dale, ''The Fall''
* Helen Garner, '' This House of Grief: The Story of a Murder Trial''
* Debi Marshall, ''The Family Court Murders''
* Kate McClymont and Linton Besser, ''He Who Must Be Obeid''
* David Murray, ''The Murder of Allison Baden-Clay''
* Liam Pieper, ''The Feel-Good Hit of the Year''

;2014
Best Crime Novel
* Garry Disher, ''Bitter Wash Road''
* Kathryn Fox, ''Fatal Impact''
* Adrian McKinty, '' In The Morning I'll Be Gone''
* PM Newton, ''Beams Falling''
* Stephen Orr, ''One Boy Missing''
* Angela Savage, ''The Dying Beach''

Best First Crime Novel
* Peter Cotton, ''Dead Cat Bounce''
* Candice Fox, ''Hades''
* Alex Hammond, ''Blood Witness''
* Ellie Marney, ''Every Breath''

Best True Crime
* Paul Dale, ''Disgraced?''
* John Kidman & Denise Hofman, ''Forever Nine''
* Eleanor Learmonth & Jenny Tabakoff, ''No Mercy''
* Colin McLaren, ''JFK: The Smoking Gun''
* Duncan McNab, ''Outlaw Bikers in Australia''
* John Safran, ''Murder in Mississippi''

;2013
Best Crime Novel
* Robert Gott, ''The Holiday Murders''
* Katherine Howell, ''Web of Deceit''
* Geoffrey McGeachin, ''Blackwattle Creek''
* Adrian McKinty, ''I Hear The Sirens In The Street''
* Malla Nunn, ''Silent Valley''

Best First Crime Novel
* Paul Anderson, ''The Robbers''
* Andrew Grimes, ''The Richmond Conspiracy''
* Steve Lewis & Chris Uhlmann, ''The Marmalade Files''
* Zane Lovitt, ''The Midnight Promise''
* Sue Williams, ''Murder With The Lot''

Best True Crime
* Robin de Crespigny, ''The People Smuggler''
* Belinda Hawkins, ''Every Parent's Nightmare''
* Steve Lillebuen, ''The Devil's Cinema''
* Derek Pedley, ''Dead by Friday''
* Mark Tedeschi QC, ''Eugenia''

;2012
Best Crime Novel
* J. C. Burke, '' Pig Boy''
* Malcolm Knox, '' The Life''
* Barry Maitland, ''Chelsea Mansions''

Best First Crime Novel
* Claire Corbett, ''When We Have Wings''
* Peter Twohig, ''The Cartographer''
* Kim Westwood, ''The Courier's New Bicycle''

Best True Crime
* Eamonn Duff, ''Sins of the Father''
* Michael Duffy, ''Call Me Cruel''
* Liz Porter, ''Cold Case File''

;2011
Best Crime Novel
* Angela Savage, ''The Half-Child''
* Geoffrey McGeachin, ''The Diggers Rest Hotel''
* Chris Womersley, ''Bereft''

Best First Crime Novel
* Alan Carter, ''Prime Cut''
* David Whish-Wilson, ''Line of Sight''
* P.M. Newton, ''The Old School''

Best True Crime
* Geesche Jacobson, ''Abandoned: The Sad Death of Dianne Brimble''
* Ross Honeywill, ''Wasted''
* Lindsay Simpson & Jennifer Cooke, ''Honeymoon Dive''

;20102010 Ned Kelly Award - Shortlists
/ref>
Best Crime Novel
* Lenny Bartulin, ''The Black Russian''
* Michael Robotham, ''Bleed For Me''
* Garry Disher, ''Wyatt''

Best First Crime Novel
* Andrew Coome, ''Document Z''
* Mark Dapin, ''King of the Cross''
* Robin Adair, ''Death and the Running Patterer''

Best True Crime
* Peter Doyle, ''Crooks like Us''
* Kathy Marks, ''Pitcairn: Paradise Lost''
* Robert M. Kaplan, ''Medical Murder: Disturbing Cases of Doctors Who Kill''

See also

* List of Australian literary awards

References

{{reflist

External links

Holders of the Ned Kelly Awards

Australian literary awards
Awards established in 1996


Mystery and detective fiction awards
1996 establishments in Australia