His published first novel was
A Clever Wife (1895), but he secured his first striking success with his fifth, ''Mord Em'ly'' (1898), which showed his ability to draw humorous portraits of lower-class life. All his friends considered Pett Ridge to be one of life's natural bachelors. They were rather surprised therefore in 1909 when he married Olga Hentschel. Four of his books, including ''Mord Em'ly'', were adapted as films in the early 1920s, all with scripts by
Eliot Stannard. Pett Ridge's great popularity as a novelist in the early part of the century declined in the latter years of his life. His work was considered to be rather old fashioned, though he still wrote and had published at least one book in each year in the final decade of his life. His last work,
Led by Westmacott, was published in the year after his death. William Pett Ridge died, aged 71, at his home, Ampthill, Willow Grove, Chislehurst, on 29 September 1930 and was cremated at West Norwood on 2 October 1930. His ashes were taken away by his surviving family, his wife, a son, and his daughter Olga, a pianist and teacher who married the composer
Norman Fulton in 1936. His headstone in St Nicholas Churchyard, Chislehurst describes him as a ‘Novelist and Friend of the Cockneys’. ==Legacy==