I am thrilled to share that Killer Year is back! This amazing collection of stories from the debut authors of 2007 and their International Thriller Writers (ITW) mentors is worth reading for itself, but here we are, lucky thirteen years later, and the careers of the authors inside this collection have blossomed. Some have even gone stratospheric.

There have been movies and television shows, multiple New York Times bestsellers, publishing houses established, ghostwriting and cowriting gigs secured, flourishing indie careers—the works. Some of us have published only a few books in the intervening years, some have published many. But what we all have in common is an abiding love for the crime fiction genre, which is on showcase in this collection. From supernatural suspense to mob stories, literary to private investigators, police procedural to true crime, plus stories, essays, and observations from the ITW mentors, KILLER YEAR truly has something for everyone. So sit back, relax, and let the finest voices in crime fiction take you away! I hope that you'll find some new to you authors in these gems, and seek out their work as well.

Meet the Killer Year debut authors of 2007

Brett Battles
J.T. Ellison
Jason Pinter
Bill Cameron
Dave White
Derek Nikitas
Gregg Olsen
Marcus Sakey
Robert Gregory Browne
Toni McGee Causey
Marc Lecard
Patry Francis
Sean Chercover

(with honorable mentions to original members who weren't in the anthology way back when, Sandra Ruttan, C.J. Lyons, and Phil Hawley.)

What’s this all about, you might ask? Here’s a little history on Killer Year, the organization and the anthology:

Debuts novelists didn't used to get a lot of attention, and in crime fiction particularly, many of us started in mass market paperback, which, at the time, had little to no chance of being reviewed in the trades. Concerned we might get lost in the shuffle of big name authors debuting, a few of us banded together to start a crime-fiction-specific marketing organization to raise the profile of ALL the debut authors in the genre. We of course missed a few, folks like Laura Benedict and Karna Bodman, among others, but a small knot of writers got involved, and we went into the very first Thrillerfest armed with T-shirts, postcards, riding a wave of media and our own enthusiasm so high that we drew the attention of the leadership of ITW. M.J. Rose, Steve Berry, and Lee Child in particular thought what we were doing was smart, and sat down with us to offer a deal—let ITW adopt the Killer Year program. Each of us got a mentor, an established ITW bestseller who helped us navigate our release year, read our books, offered personal advice and public support. It was a staggering cool situation, made all the better by actually working—our debut novels all got press. We got reviews. We got blurbs from bestsellers. We got media attention. We made a splash. (The Debutante Ball was the literary/women's fiction equivalent of our program, definitely check them out, too.)

There were other positive downstream effect of Killer Year that continue to this day. ITW was able to design a debut author program that brought up each new "class" of writers, year after year. Publishing in general paid attention as well, and lo these many years later, being a debut is a special, incredible, managed "event" rather than a spaghetti against the wall attempt to start a career.

Pretty heady stuff.

The anthology was a natural extension of this endeavor. My own mentor, the indomitable Lee Child, stepped in as editor. M.J. wrote us an introduction that perfectly explained the adage we all now know to be true: a rising tide lifts all boats. Laura Lippman gave us a coda. Mentors Allison Brennan, Ken Bruen, and Duane Swierczynski wrote original stories. And all the Killer Year members wrote a tale, which is introduced by their individual mentors. St. Martins did us proud with the release, and now, Two Tales is trying to do the same.

This is a special, special collection, in too many ways to count. I hope you love it—especially this stunning new cover! It's gonna be a Killer Year, again!

What are you reading this weekend?