Sinner (Hammesfahr) - Author Bio

Author Bio
• Birth—May 10, 1951
• Where—Titz, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany
• Education—N/A
• Awards—Crime Prize of Wiesbaden; Rhineland Literary Prize
• Currently—lives near Cologne, Germany


Hailed as Germany’s Patricia Highsmith, Petra Hammesfahr has written more than 20 crime and suspense novels, and also writes scripts for film and television. She has won numerous literary prizes, including the Crime Prize of Wiesbaden and the Rhineland Literary Prize.

Hammesfahr's early life was not an easy one. She left school at 13, was married and pregnant by 17. Her husband was an alcoholic. But those experiences she later drew upon for her fiction, a frequent theme of which is the junction of childhood innocence and adult calamity.

Hammesfahr's breakthrough novel, The Sinner, was first published in Germany in 1999, where it remained on the bestseller list for more than 15 months. It was published in England in 2007 and in the U.S. in 2010, becoming both a critical and commercial success. In 2017, the novel was adapted for a TV miniseries, starring Jessica Biel and Bill Pullman. (Adapted from the publisher and Bitter Lemon Press.)