Louise Penny wins International Thriller Writers' Silver Bullet Award, recognizing public service
The Quebec-based writer is recognized for a lifetime of service and support of non-profit organizations
Louise Penny has won the 2024 Silver Bullet Award presented by International Thriller Writers (ITW) at the 19th annual ThrillerFest in Manhattan. It recognizes her outstanding contribution to education, literacy, reading, writing and the public good.
Penny is a celebrated writer best known for her mystery series following Chief Inspector Armand Gamache. The book series includes Still Life, Bury Your Dead, A Trick of the Light and A World of Curiosities and have sold more than four million copies worldwide. In 2022, they were adapted into an Amazon Original eight-episode series called Three Pines.
Penny won the 2020 Agatha Award for best contemporary novel for the 16th book in the series, All the Devils Are Here. In 2013, she was named to the Order of Canada.
While she's received many accolades for her writing career, accepting an award for her commitment to charitable work is especially meaningful.
"One day the writing will stop and one day the books may even be forgotten — I hope not," said Penny in an interview with CBC Books. "And what will be left behind is whether I was a decent human being or not."
Penny has been instrumental in numerous charitable projects, including writing a Gamache novella, The Hangman, for adults reading at a Grade 3 level as part of a GoodReads Canada initiative to promote literacy for emerging adult readers and founding the Three Pines Foundation to help caregivers of those with dementia, fund literary programmes, and support animal rights initiatives.
"The reason I can give back, I'm extremely aware of this, is that people support my books. I don't think of this as my money. I think of this as money from all the readers who have bought the Gamache books and supported the Gamache books and allowed me, through them, to do some of this work. So it's certainly an award shared by by millions."
Although the Inspector Gamache books are mysteries and deal with topics of murder and cruelty, they are informed by Penny's commitment to giving back.
"The murder is a catalyst to look at all sorts of other issues," she said. "The lead motif line, the artery that runs through all the books is the issue of community, of belonging, of friendship, of love in all of its forms."
"And at the end of the day, the fact that we cannot turn a blind eye to all the cruelty in the world, but it cannot overshadow decency and our awareness that goodness exists and hope."
