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Sarah Rhiannon Ward (living) is an English novelist and critic living in thePeak District of ruralDerbyshire. She writes a crime fiction series asSarah Ward and has also written a Gothic thriller asRhiannon Ward.[1][2]
A series of four novels by Ward –In Bitter Chill (2015),A Deadly Thaw (2017),A Patient Fury (2018, chosen as "Thriller of the Month" byThe Observer) andThe Shrouded Path (2019) – are set in the Derbyshire Dales, where she lives. They feature a female detective, Connie Childs. The Northern EnglishLancashire Evening Post noted that the fourth novel is "moody, menacing and with more than a hint of the macabre... a mystery that grips like a raw day in the Peaks."[3]
The books are set in and near the fictional town of Bampton, which the author states "is partly based onBuxton with its Georgian architecture,Bakewell, which is a well-heeled market town with a strong tourist industry, andCromford with its canal and fantastic industrial heritage."[4]
Ward's latest novel,The Quickening (2021), is described as a Gothic thriller. It appeared under the name Rhiannon Ward. All her books have been published in the United Kingdom byFaber. At least two have also appeared in the United States.[5]
Ward's critical work preceded her own novel-writing.[6] She has written frequent accounts of work by others, in the British newspapersThe Guardian and theSunday Express magazine, in the freebyMetro and elsewhere, including theLos Angeles Review of Books.[7] She still reviews crime fiction widely on her Crimepieces site.[1]
Sarah Ward is Membership Secretary of theCrime Writers' Association and an associate board member ofDerby Book Festival.[8] She is also a judge for the Petrona Award for Scandinavian crime novels in translation.[9]
Ward related in a press interview: "I grew up in the neighbouring county of Cheshire and then after university in Liverpool, I lived first in London and then in Athens, Greece. When I returned to the UK I briefly lived in London but decided I preferred to be out of the capital so moved to Derbyshire.... [This] coincided with changes in my personal life."[4]
Sarah Ward gained much information about British police procedures past and present from a cousin (named only as Peter), who retired as a chief inspector from the force inDyfed–Powys Police, Wales.[4]
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