Sarah L. Hawthorn

Sarah L. Hawthorn is a Canadian writer based in Halifax/Kjipuktuk, Nova Scotia. Her work combines queer gothic horror, historical fantasy, and speculative fiction. Her debut novel, A Fate Worse Than Drowning, is set in 1860s Halifax and follows lighthouse keeper Elle’s Faustian bargain to save her sister. Hawthorn’s earlier short fiction appeared in The Arcanist and the Queer Blades anthology.

She is emerging as a novelist after years spent developing her writing while working and studying. She is not self-published, but Poisoned Pen Press, which published her debut, is a documented independent mystery press and part of Sourcebooks, an independent publisher — making Hawthorn a small/independent-press author rather than a major-house one.