"Russian For Beginners"

by Dominique Biebau

"This month's entry in Passport to Crime is by a Flemish author who won both the 2019 Hercule Poirot Prize for best Flemish crime novel and the 2020 Gouden Strop (Golden Noose) Award given annually in The Netherlands for the best crime novel by a Dutch or Flemish author. The book for which he won both awards has the same title as this story. We've learned that the story came first, but this is the first English-language publication of it."

In April of 2023, EQMM announced that "Russian For Beginners" tied for ninth place in its annual Readers Award balloting. This was the first time one of my translations made it into the Top Ten.

A month later, "Russian For Beginners" was named a finalist for the International Thriller Writers' annual Thriller Award in the Best Short Story category. It didn't win, but it was the only translated story to make the shortlist..

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