Colin Cotterill’s delightfully different crime novels, set in Laos and starring the septugenarian sleuth Siri Paiboun, have been honoured with the UK Crime Writers' Association’s ‘Dagger in the Library’ Award.

This annual award is given to ‘the author of crime fiction whose work is currently giving the greatest enjoyment to library users’; authors are nominated by UK libraries and Readers’ Groups and judged by a panel of librarians. The judges called Siri Paiboun ‘an unusual hero in an unusual setting’, and said the books are ‘quirky, funny and very appealing…a truly beautiful read’.