Phyllis Bentley was born in 1894 in Halifax, West Yorkshire, where she was educated until she attended Cheltenham Ladies College, Gloucestershire.
In 1932 her best-known work, Inheritance, was published to widespread critical acclaim and commercial success. This was in contrast to her previous efforts, a collection of short stories entitled The World's Bane and several poor-selling novels. The triumph of Inheritance made her the most successful English regional novelist since Thomas Hardy, and she produced two more novels to create a trilogy; The Rise of Henry Morcar and A Man of His Time. This accomplishment made her a much demanded speaker and she became an expert on the Bronte family.
Over her career Bentley garnered many awards; an honorary DLitt from Leeds University (1949); a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature (1958); awarded an OBE (1970).She died in 1977.