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Lock Your Doors and Leave the Lights On!
The Clue Awards Spotlight the Darker Side of Crime Fiction
The submissions for the 2025 Awards are underway, and Clue closes submissions on July 30, 2025!
The Clue Awards celebrate the grittier, more intense side of crime and mystery fiction—where shadows hold secrets, justice comes at a cost, and the line between hero and villain blurs. While cozy mysteries offer comfort, the Clue Awards recognize the authors who aren’t afraid to explore the darker corners of human nature and criminal minds.
From psychological thrillers that keep readers awake at night to political conspiracies ripped from today’s headlines, the Clue Awards honor the storytellers who understand that the best crime fiction doesn’t just entertain—it reveals uncomfortable truths about the world we live in.
You know you want it…
The Categories That Define Crime Excellence
- Detective/Crime features the classic investigative stories where seasoned detectives and determined cops work to solve cases that challenge both their skills and their moral compass.
- Suspense/Thriller delivers heart-pounding tension and psychological complexity—think Gone Girl meets The Silence of the Lambs, where every page turn could reveal a shocking twist.
- Private Eye/Noir captures the atmospheric world of hard-boiled investigators and morally ambiguous characters navigating corruption and betrayal in the tradition of Raymond Chandler and modern masters like Tana French.
- Legal/Medical/Police Procedural combines professional expertise with compelling storytelling—from courtroom dramas to forensic mysteries that showcase the intersection of science and justice.
- US Political Thriller explores the dangerous world of power, corruption, and conspiracy in American politics, more relevant than ever in today’s climate.
- Spy/Espionage/Undercover delves into the shadowy world of international intrigue, double agents, and high-stakes missions where one wrong move could mean death.
- True Crime/Investigation represents our newest unique non-fiction category, recognizing the section in the bookstore right next to thrillers. Stories of real criminal events that will chill you.
Celebrating Our 2024 Clue Grand Prize Winner for Thriller/Suspense!
John DeDakis with his Clue Grand Prize Ribbon
After months of reviewing entries, we’re thrilled to announce that John DeDakis claimed the 2024 Clue Grand Prize with his politically charged thriller Enemies Domestic! This achievement is particularly meaningful given DeDakis’s extraordinary background as a CNN Senior Copy Editor and former White House correspondent who covered presidents Reagan and Carter.
DeDakis brings authentic expertise to the political thriller genre that few authors can match. His 25-year career at CNN, including his role as Senior Copy Editor for “The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer,” provides him with insider knowledge of how political crises unfold—knowledge that translates into gripping, believable fiction.
Enemies Domestic represents the pinnacle of political thriller writing: a story that feels ripped from tomorrow’s headlines, crafted by someone who’s spent decades in America’s newsrooms. In addition to all the featured posts that have already gone out for the Clue Awards, Enemies Domestic will be regularly promoted throughout the year and for the next five years in our upcoming Hall of Fame post. John DeDakis will also be invited to participate in a Chanticleer 10-Question Interview, and Enemies Domestic will receive a coveted Chanticleer Editorial Review.
Looking for Your Next Edge-of-Your-Seat Read?
Check out some of these incredible crime and thriller books we’ve reviewed recently that showcase the diversity and intensity of the genre!
BUTTERFLY PINNED
By Leslie Liautaud
Fleeing a small and troubled life back home, college student Marin falls headfirst into the attention of the fabulous, wealthy, and mercurial Bette. In Leslie Liautaud’s psychological thriller Butterfly Pinned, Marin gives body and soul to Bette for agonizing want of transformation.
Marin has toiled for the chance to become someone new and continues to fall back into her old limitations. Even as she moves to Chicago with a college scholarship, she struggles to escape the shadows of anxiety and poor self-esteem. But a chance meeting with Bette Winston casts her in glorious and terrible light.
Bette enthralls Marin with poetry, luxury, and the backdoor invitation to a world of refined grandeur. She convinces Marin to double-major in philosophy, while pulling her away from classes and all other mundane responsibilities. Marin gets to share this new world with Bette’s high-class friends Ozzie and Harry, shunning any connection to her old, embarrassing life. But as she meets those who know Bette beneath her lustrous glamor, Marin glimpses a sinister history.
WHERE The SLEEPING LADY LIES
By M.E. Schuman
An Environmental Thriller inspired by the 9.2 Good Friday earthquake of 1964 in South Central Alaska, M.E. Schuman’s Where the Sleeping Lady Lies is a story of political espionage and environmental danger.
The legend of the Sleeping Lady is a tale of a giant woman who falls asleep waiting for her lover to return from battle. When tragic news arrives that her lover was killed, the other women cannot bear to wake her, and to this day the Sleeping Lady still lies as part of the landscape.
In the present day, Sam is on her way back to Alaska, a few weeks after a catastrophic earthquake has hit.
SMITE The WATERS: The Isaak Collection
By David T. Isaak
Smite the Waters by David T. Isaak begins with the xenophobic billionaire Rex Atwater whose goal is to eliminate terrorism. His certainty that it’s “us” or “them” has led him to one horrifying conclusion: he must nuke Mecca.
Convinced of his twisted plot’s perfection, Atwater assembles a deadly team. Carla Smukowski is a military assassin mourning the death of her brother. Boyce Hammond works as a covert FBI agent deeply entrenched in a right-wing movement. And rounding out the cast is Gerald Graves, a nuclear expert willing to commit this heinous crime. Together, they vow to annihilate terrorism.
Virtually every character in this story is fully fleshed out, gritty and driven, to draw the reader deep into their individual stories.
SOMETHING I KEEP UPSTAIRS
By J.D. Barker
An old and hungry thing wakes beneath the house on Wood Island. It calls out to another generation of children. In J.D. Barker’s supernatural mystery, Something I Keep Upstairs, a circle of New Castle teenagers digs up the unholy secrets of those who came before them.
When the hermit Geraldine Rote dies without clear cause, her grandson Spivey inherits Wood Island and the historic house upon it. He plans to spend the summer as a carefree sixteen-year-old rather than submitting to another round of cancer treatments. With the help of the mysterious estate lawyer Marston, Spivey escapes his parents’ reach.
At first, the island becomes a perpetual party, drawing an endless stream of kids and alcohol. But only a few learn the truth behind Wood Island’s dark stories.
These reviews are only a glimpse of the compelling criminal minds and complex investigations waiting to be discovered in today’s crime fiction.
See the Chanticleer Difference for Yourself!
We’re excited about all the exceptional books we receive every year for both the CIBAs and for our Editorial Reviews. Throughout this year’s Clue Book Awards, we had the pleasure of promoting more than fifty books as they advanced through our competition tiers. The Chanticleer International Book Awards offers an incredible $30,000 in cash, prizes, and promotion across all divisions!
This is the journey from beginning to end for the CIBAs! Every list you make means more promotion for you and your work as each advancement tier is posted right here on our website, on our social media, and also out in our newsletter! Your book deserves to be discovered.
Don’t Let Your Crime Story Remain Unsolved!
The crime and thriller market is more competitive than ever, but readers are hungry for authentic, well-crafted stories that keep them guessing until the final page. Whether your thriller explores political corruption, features a hardboiled detective, or investigates a real criminal case, the Clue Awards provide the recognition and promotion platform your work deserves.
Crime fiction has the power to illuminate society’s darkest corners while delivering the satisfaction of justice served. Don’t let your story remain in the shadows—submit to the Clue Awards today and join the ranks of celebrated crime writers who’ve found their audience through Chanticleer!
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