Our judge Martin Penny, author of several crime books, has this to say:
'I’ve finally finished reading all of last year’s entries to the Black Spring Crime-Writing Prize. It’s been a long (but satisfying) process and I finished somewhat later than anticipated, so my apologies to those I’ve kept in suspense.
Once again, the submissions covered many different aspects of the genre and contained great diversity. Selecting a winner is very much down to personal opinion, and my notes after my first reading of Expiation included such gems as: Excellent throughout and Tense and very well written. So, Expiation is a very well deserved winner.
The two runners-up should also be proud of their manuscripts, which I thoroughly enjoyed reading. I’d like to thank everyone who entered and assure them that their work was read from beginning to end.
