Local author and poet Rita Hanner-Ward was honored by the Phoenix Writers’ Club at its March 21 meeting at the Devonshire Senior Center in Phoenix. Her poem “Inheritance” won first place in the PWC Founders Centennial Contest, a competition celebrating the club’s 100th anniversary and pioneering women writers and journalists whose work helped shape Phoenix’s literary landscape.
Additionally, writing as Kiva Wolfe, Hanner-Ward’s novel “Red Flash” — recipient of the Manhattan Book Awards Silver Seal — was named second runner-up in the Indies Today 2026 Awards in the Romance-Suspense category.
Hanner-Ward lives in Sun City West, where she writes, volunteers with hospice and participates in the local library’s writing group.
