It’s paperback publication day for Annie Ward in America! Her riveting thriller, Beautiful Bad (Park Row Books) hits the shelves today. The hardback edition was nominated for Best Debut Novel by the 11th Annual Strand Magazine Critics Awards 2019.
Maddie and Ian’s love story began at a party overseas while she was visiting her best friend, Jo. Now, almost two decades later, they are married with a beautiful son and living the perfect American life. But when a camping accident leaves Maddie badly scarred, she begins attending writing therapy, where she gradually reveals her fears about Ian, her concerns for her safety and the couple’s tangled and tumultuous past with Jo.
From the electric streets of the Balkans to a quiet suburb in Kansas, sixteen years of love and fear, adventure and suspicion, culminate in the Day of the Killing, when a frantic 911 call summons the police to the scene of a shocking crime. Twisty and utterly original, Beautiful Bad shows that appearances are deceptive and even the most seemingly perfect couples have something to hide…
“As imaginatively constructed as it is compelling. Filled with unexpected twists, BEAUTIFUL BAD is a riveting read.” Sarah Pekkanen, New York Times bestselling author of The Wife Between Us
“You won’t be able to tear yourself away from the page. With fascinating characters that chill and horrify, the ending will leave you staggered.” Liv Constantine, author of the national bestseller The Last Mrs. Parrish
“Beautiful Bad is beautifully written, beautifully twisty – and beautifully twisted. A dark thriller with real psychological depth” JP Delaney, author of The Girl Before
“This is a sometimes tender, sometimes gory, but endlessly gripping book. An American travel writer falls for a troubled British soldier, with terrifying consequences that will keep even the most experienced thriller reader guessing until the last page.” Daily Mail, “Best Thrillers of 2019”
Beautiful Bad was published in hardback in the UK last January to great critical acclaim, and will be out in paperback in February 2020 (Quercus).
Annie Ward has a BA in English Literature from UCLA and an MFA in Screenwriting from the American Film Institute. Her first short screenplay, Strange Habit, starred Adam Scott and won awards at Aspen and Sundance Film Festivals. Ward lives in Kansas with her two sons and husband, who she met in the Balkans.
