In recent years she has found success as a novelist. Her Crown Colony series of historical murder mysteries, about a teenaged female Peranakan detective in 1930s and 1940s Singapore, was optioned in 2021 for television by international production company Poisson Rouge Pictures.

Ovidia, who had a very protected, middle-class childhood, began writing short stories when she was 10. She was not athletically inclined, much preferring reading to anything else. She dreamt of living the lives she was reading about, such as Tarzan swinging through the jungle, and Gerald Durrell with his family of animals.

“I think that I realised ultimately the writer had the ‘power’ to create those lives and stories,” she said. “And that’s when I started writing my own stories of what it would be like living as someone else somewhere else.

“It grew naturally from my love of writing. I didn’t think of it as developing writing skills, but I would write sequels to books I liked and write about adventures I imagined having and I remember writing long family sagas involving many generations feuding over who knows what, but the children getting together to solve things.”

At school Ovidia was in the science stream and, encouraged by her parents and friends to forge a career as a doctor, after her A levels she opted to study medicine. But it dawned on her during her first year in medical school that she did not really want to become a doctor, and especially not if the training required her to cut up live animals.

She dropped out of medical school and instead submitted her first entry in a writing competition. Her story ‘A Dream of China’ won the top prize in the Asiaweek short story contest, opening her eyes to the possibility of becoming a professional writer.

She returned to university, this time as a student in the National University of Singapore’s (NUS) department of English language and literature. She eventually graduated with a master’s degree in English.

It was while Ovidia was at NUS that she started writing plays. She submitted a murder mystery (Dead on Cue) for the NUS-Shell short play competition. It won second prize, and a student group that later became The Necessary Stage performed it – and Ovidia was hooked.

Her sharp observations of gender issues became plays with provocative titles, such as Breast Issues (1997) and Hitting (On) Women (2007). In 1993, she won Singapore’s first major award at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival with the play, The Woman in A Tree On A Hill.

Ovidia has written more than 30 plays, some of which have been staged in Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur, Glasgow, and Edinburgh. She has worked with many theatre groups, including TheatreWorks, The Necessary Stage, Action Theatre, Arts and Acts, Music & Movement, WOW International and Wayang-Wayang Theatre Company.

Her shift from crafting plays to writing novels began when her play Round and Round the Dining Table was filmed by Mediacorp. One of the characters in the production was played by Ovidia’s friend Rani Moorthy. This spurred Ovidia into writing her first full-length murder mystery, Miss Moorthy Investigates, with the lead character very loosely based on Rani’s experiences as a teacher.

“This made me see that I actually like writing books better than plays. You can ‘cast’ anyone you like in your books. And you can do a lot more stuff without worrying about how much props cost,” said Ovidia.

It is hard in Singapore to make a living as a writer, whether of plays or novels, and for many years Ovidia paid the bills by working as a copywriter, magazine editor, tutor, and relief teacher. But when she turned 50 in 2011, she decided to concentrate on writing fiction.

Her second mystery novel, Aunty Lee’s Delights, which was published in 2013, was a huge success and saw her going on promotional tours in the United States to critical acclaim. It put Ovidia in the rarefied ranks of Singaporean writers with an international following.

Ovidia is the recipient of the Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry (JCCI) Singapore Foundation Culture Award (1996), the National Arts Council (NAC) Young Artist Award (1996) and the Singapore Youth Award (1997). She has also won a Fulbright Fellowship to attend the University of Iowa’s International Writer’s Program.

In recent years she has found success as a novelist. Her Crown Colony series of historical murder mysteries, about a teenaged female Peranakan detective in 1930s and 1940s Singapore, was optioned in 2021 for television by international production company Poisson Rouge Pictures.

Ovidia, who had a very protected, middle-class childhood, began writing short stories when she was 10. She was not athletically inclined, much preferring reading to anything else. She dreamt of living the lives she was reading about, such as Tarzan swinging through the jungle, and Gerald Durrell with his family of animals.

“I think that I realised ultimately the writer had the ‘power’ to create those lives and stories,” she said. “And that’s when I started writing my own stories of what it would be like living as someone else somewhere else.

“It grew naturally from my love of writing. I didn’t think of it as developing writing skills, but I would write sequels to books I liked and write about adventures I imagined having and I remember writing long family sagas involving many generations feuding over who knows what, but the children getting together to solve things.”

At school Ovidia was in the science stream and, encouraged by her parents and friends to forge a career as a doctor, after her A levels she opted to study medicine. But it dawned on her during her first year in medical school that she did not really want to become a doctor, and especially not if the training required her to cut up live animals.

She dropped out of medical school and instead submitted her first entry in a writing competition. Her story ‘A Dream of China’ won the top prize in the Asiaweek short story contest, opening her eyes to the possibility of becoming a professional writer.

She returned to university, this time as a student in the National University of Singapore’s (NUS) department of English language and literature. She eventually graduated with a master’s degree in English.

It was while Ovidia was at NUS that she started writing plays. She submitted a murder mystery (Dead on Cue) for the NUS-Shell short play competition. It won second prize, and a student group that later became The Necessary Stage performed it – and Ovidia was hooked.

Her sharp observations of gender issues became plays with provocative titles, such as Breast Issues (1997) and Hitting (On) Women (2007). In 1993, she won Singapore’s first major award at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival with the play, The Woman in A Tree On A Hill.

Ovidia has written more than 30 plays, some of which have been staged in Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur, Glasgow, and Edinburgh. She has worked with many theatre groups, including TheatreWorks, The Necessary Stage, Action Theatre, Arts and Acts, Music & Movement, WOW International and Wayang-Wayang Theatre Company.

Her shift from crafting plays to writing novels began when her play Round and Round the Dining Table was filmed by Mediacorp. One of the characters in the production was played by Ovidia’s friend Rani Moorthy. This spurred Ovidia into writing her first full-length murder mystery, Miss Moorthy Investigates, with the lead character very loosely based on Rani’s experiences as a teacher.

“This made me see that I actually like writing books better than plays. You can ‘cast’ anyone you like in your books. And you can do a lot more stuff without worrying about how much props cost,” said Ovidia.

It is hard in Singapore to make a living as a writer, whether of plays or novels, and for many years Ovidia paid the bills by working as a copywriter, magazine editor, tutor, and relief teacher. But when she turned 50 in 2011, she decided to concentrate on writing fiction.

Her second mystery novel, Aunty Lee’s Delights, which was published in 2013, was a huge success and saw her going on promotional tours in the United States to critical acclaim. It put Ovidia in the rarefied ranks of Singaporean writers with an international following.

Ovidia is the recipient of the Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry (JCCI) Singapore Foundation Culture Award (1996), the National Arts Council (NAC) Young Artist Award (1996) and the Singapore Youth Award (1997). She has also won a Fulbright Fellowship to attend the University of Iowa’s International Writer’s Program.