The Edgar Award, as Denver author and Edgar finalist David Heska Wanbli Weiden puts it, is “like the Oscars for crime writers. It’s like our National Book Award.” So it was a big deal when Weiden’s thriller
Winter Counts was shortlisted. It’s an even bigger deal that he’s only the second Native American writer to be named a finalist in the prize’s storied history.
Not that the Edgars are the only organization recognizing Weiden’s work far from it. He’s already won a Lefty Award for Best Debut Novel, and the Western Writers of America presented his book with the Best Contemporary Novel and Best Debut Novel awards. Still pending is a cornucopia of other awards: the Barry, the Thriller, a Colorado Book Award, a Reading the West prize, and the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award. Weiden is going to be busy and he might want to be making space on his fireplace mantel for all those pen-shaped trophies and whatnot.