Steel - Ian Fleming 2018

Attica Locke
Bluebird, Bluebird
winner
Serpent's Tail

This thrillingly written examination of racial tensions in the American South is evocative and provocative. The personal jeopardy of the protagonist – a black cop in a white world where it may be dangerous to find the killer – is subtly interwoven with America’s racial fault lines past and present. If the distinction between ‘crime’ and ‘literary’ fiction is ever killed off, Locke will be a prime suspect.