What if everything you believed about your family was built on a lie?

When Kathleen Spada discovers that her mother was sold as a child, taken from her biological family, and raised under a false identity, the revelation sends her on a decades-long search through forgotten archives, family records, cemeteries, churches, and the stories people tried to leave behind.

As buried secrets emerge, so do the women who shaped them: a grandmother who never stopped watching from the margins, a child whose identity was rewritten, and the mysterious woman who orchestrated it all.

Blending memoir, investigative research, family mystery, and narrative nonfiction, WARD is an unforgettable journey into the lives that were hidden—and the voices that refused to disappear.

About the Author

Kathleen Spada is a writer and scholar whose work explores memory, inheritance, and the way trauma transfers through women and across generations. She holds a PhD in Literary Nonfiction and Composition/Rhetoric from the University of Cincinnati where her research for WARD was supported by fellowships and awards, including the PEO Scholar’s Award. Kathleen teaches writing and directs the writing center at Northern Kentucky University.