In memoriam: Authors we lost in 2023

In memoriam: Authors we lost in 2023

In Reading Lists by Lanie Pemberton

In memoriam: Authors we lost in 2023

Like any year, 2023 has been filled with extraordinary highs and heartbreaking lows — including deaths of famous authors like Cormac McCarthy (The Road), Milan Kundera (The Book of Laughter and Forgetting), and Echo Brown (Black Girl Unlimited). Though these writers, poets, and creatives have passed away, their written words left an indelible mark on our hearts and the world.

Join us in celebrating the legacy of the writers who died recently by reading some of their most beloved stories and memoirs.

Diplomacy by Henry Kissinger

Kissinger’s legacy may be polarizing, but the former Secretary of State was undoubtedly an influential figure in geopolitics. “Diplomacy” is his fundamental work on international relations — including the history of the very concept and Kissinger’s own experiences as a foreign diplomat. Kissinger died on November 29, 2023, at 100 years old.

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Perry is best known for portraying Chandler Bing on the NBC sitcom and cultural phenomenon Friends. Like Bing, who hid his insecurities behind self-deprecating humor, Perry silently battled plenty of demons before, during, and after the show’s heyday.

His memoir explores his struggles with substance abuse and depression, while seamlessly weaving plenty of humor throughout. “So much has been written about me in the past,” Perry wrote on Twitter. “I thought it was time people heard from me.” Perry passed on October 28, 2023, at age 54.

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The Wild Iris by Louise Gluck

Glück, long considered one of America’s greatest contemporary poets, died on October 13, 2023, at 80 years old. A former U.S. Poet Laureate, she earned the 2020 Nobel Prize in Literature, a National Book Award for Faithful and Virtuous Night in 2014, and the Pulitzer Prize for this book of poetry in 1993. Glück penned The Wild Iris after a two-year writing hiatus; she spent her time gardening instead, as reflected in these poems about nature and human suffering.

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Black Girl Unlimited by Echo Brown

Brown’s writing career began with the 2015 theatrical production Black Virgins Are Not for Hipsters, her one-woman show. Inspired by the performance, a literary agent reached out to Brown asking if she wanted to write a young adult novel. 

Like her stage play, Black Girl Unlimited is a semi-autobiographical story, and it uses magical realism to explore coming-of-age while coping with abuse and poverty. Brown, who suffered from lupus and battled renal failure, passed away on September 16, 2023, at the young age of 39.

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Rememberings by Sinéad O'Connor

Acclaimed musician and controversial activist O’Connor (who changed her name to Shuhada Sadaqat in 2018 after converting to Islam) died on July 26, 2023, at 56 years old. In her memoir, the Dublin native writes candidly about her career, including covering Prince’s “Nothing Compares 2 U” and tearing up a photo of the pope on SNL in 1992 over sexual abuse in the Catholic Church, which sparked outrage. She also delves vulnerably into her troubled childhood, finding her way as an adult, and becoming a mother. Her youngest son, Shane, died by suicide in 2022.

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Award-winning Czech-French novelist Kundera passed away on July 11, 2023, at 94 years old. Though best known for The Unbearable Lightness of Being, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting was Kundera’s first publicly praised work. It challenges conventional storytelling by combining fiction, autobiography, and historical commentary in a non-linear plot that ponders memory, identity, and personal freedom. “The combination of a frivolous form and a serious subject immediately unmasks the truth about our dramas,” Kundera once said in an interview with the Paris Review.

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A House Is A House for Me by Mary Ann Hoberman

Hoberman was a former Children’s Poet Laureate and winner of the National Book Award for this endearing work, A House is a House for Me. Hailing from Stamford, Connecticut, Hoberman always loved to write, but her foray into children’s books began once she started her own family. The poet and author wrote continuously until her final days (her collection How Elegant the Elephant is set to publish in 2024). She passed away on July 7, 2023, at 92 years old.

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Called “one of the most eminent literary editors in publishing history,” Gottlieb passed on June 14, 2023, at 92 years old. The former editor-in-chief of Simon & Schuster, Knopf, and The New Yorker worked with many literary notables, including Toni Morrison, Salman Rushdie, Ray Bradbury, and Joseph Heller (Gottlieb recommended Heller change his debut novel’s title from Catch-18 to Catch-22, and the rest was history). This collection includes essays Gottlieb wrote for The New York Review of Books.

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The Road by Cormac McCarthy

McCarthy, one of America’s greatest contemporary novelists who won the Pulitzer Prize, National Book Award, and MacArthur Genius Grant, passed away on June 13, 2023, at 89 years old. The late author was known for his sparse and poetic style that punctuated dark, violent stories. His acclaimed works include All the Pretty Horses, No Country for Old Men, Blood Meridian, and The Road — a post-apocalyptic tale about a nameless father and son wandering through an endless winter.

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Gypped: A Regan Reilly Mystery by Carol Higgins Clark

Cark, a murder mystery maven with a penchant for dark humor, passed away on June 12, 2023, of cancer. She’s best known for writing the Regan Reilly books — a series of standalone mysteries starring an L.A.-based private detective. Clark also co-wrote several Christmas whodunnits with her mother, the late bestselling author Mary Higgins Clark. In Gypped, P.I. Reilly becomes embroiled in a dangerous investigation at her friend’s run-down estate.

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My Love Story by Tina Turner

Turner, the Grammy Award-winning “Queen of Rock ‘n’ Roll,” passed away on May 24, 2023, at age 83. Her 2018 memoir chronicles Turner’s rise to stardom despite many obstacles — namely, her race and gender, but also spousal abuse from ex-husband and music collaborator Ike Turner. Despite these painful experiences, Turner went on to transform the music industry and become a much-needed beacon of positivity, forgiveness, and joy in the world.

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The Zone of Interest by Martin Amis

Amis, a two-time Booker Prize finalist who was considered one of the greatest English novelists of his generation, passed away on May 19, 2023, from cancer. He was 73 years old. 

Amis wrote both fiction and nonfiction, often using dark comedy or satire to skewer late-stage capitalism. The Zone of Interest is a story of longing, shame, and forbidden love set in the unlikely location of Auschwitz. Its film adaptation premieres in December 2023.

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Silverstein wrote two memoirs in her lifetime. Sick Girl chronicles her first heart transplant at the age of 24, while My Glory Was I Had Such Friends was inspired by the friends who surrounded and supported her when her first donor heart failed and she required a second transplant. Silverstein died at the age of 59 on May 5, 2023. She was a bestselling author, former lawyer, and vocal advocate for transplant medicine reform. Her Twitter account, @ajsilverstein16, will remain active to provide updates on transplantation developments.

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In the wake of Saunders’ son’s death by suicide, she wrote Five Children on the Western Front, which won the 2014 Costa Children’s Book Award. It’s a sequel to E. Nesbit’s classic Five Children and It, where the Edwardian children are now a handful of years older and have to grapple with World War I and the sobering history of the sand fairy, the Psammead. Saunders died on April 21, 2023, after living with multiple sclerosis and battling cancer.

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Perry, a prolific crime writer who passed away on April 10, 2023, is best known for her Charlotte and Thomas Pitt series, which follows a police inspector and his wife as they solve crimes in Victorian London. As a teen, Perry was convicted of murder in Christchurch, New Zealand, and spent five years in prison. The crime inspired the film Heavenly Creatures, starring Kate Winslet.

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The Fissure King by Rachel Pollack

Pollack, who passed away on April 7, 2023, was a lauded trans activist and author best known for her extensive writings on tarot and for her contributions to DC Comics’ Doom Patrol. The Fissure King, her final novel, contains five stories following the exploits of a witch doctor named Jack Shade. Upon Pollack’s death, author Neil Gaiman wrote, “May you, whoever you are, have a life like Rachel's, one that changes things for people, a life where you follow your star and leave a more interesting world behind you. And may you, like Rachel, never lose your sense of humor.”

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Jakes, an acclaimed historical fiction and sci-fi author who passed away on March 11, 2023, is best remembered for the North and South trilogy, a history epic and family saga about two friends who find themselves on opposing sides during the American Civil War. This story inspired three ABC miniseries adaptations beginning in 1985.

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Olivia by Ian Falconer

Falconer was an award-winning author and illustrator of the Olivia series, children’s books which follow the antics of a young pig and have been adapted for TV and film. Falconer wrote the first book in the series, which received a Caldecott Honor, as a Christmas gift for his young niece, Olivia. Falconer passed away on March 7, 2023.

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The Silent Cry by Kenzaburō Ōe

There are few figures in modern Japanese literature that are bigger than Ōe, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1994. The Silent Cry is one of his earliest and most ambitious works, a philosophical and political tour de force heavily influenced by World War II and the birth of his son, Hikari, who was born with a brain herniation. Ōe died at the age of 88 on March 3, 2023.

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The Victoria Vanishes by Christopher Fowler

Fowler, who passed away from cancer on March 2, 2023, was a mystery and thriller writer who won many awards for his works, including several British Fantasy Awards. Of his dozens of novels, Fowler was perhaps best known for his Bryant and May mysteries, including The Victoria Vanishes, which involves serial murders in London and a vanishing pub.

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Dead Wrong by Richard Belzer

Belzer, an actor and comedian who passed away on February 19, 2023, is best known for portraying dry, no-nonsense Detective John Munch on two long-running NBC TV shows: Homicide: Life on the Streets and Law and Order: Special Victims Unit. Belzer also earned a reputation as a conspiracy theorist. Dead Wrong explores some of Belzer’s theories surrounding cover ups by the American government.

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When Hollis wrote Get out of Your Own Way, it seemed like he was already living a dream life: He was a former Disney executive and married to lifestyle maven Rachel Hollis (Girl, Wash Your Face), with whom he had four children. But the book details the demons that plagued him, and the advice that helped him do battle with the things holding him back. Hollis died of an accidental drug overdose on February 11, 2023, at age 47.

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Author Spoto lived a fascinating life himself: He was a professor of theology and a celebrity biographer. High Society is an intimate portrait of Grace Kelly, the actress and real-life princess who was also one of Spoto’s friends. A brain hemorrhage caused Spoto’s death on February 11, 2023, when he was 81.

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Bacharach was an award-winning musician and composer who wrote pop songs for some of the leading artists of the 20th century, including The Carpenters, Dionne Warwick, and Perry Como. This memoir chronicles the highs and lows of Bacharach’s life, including the loss of his daughter and his songwriting partnership with Hal David. Bacharach died on February 8, 2023.

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In the Line of Fire: A Memoir by Pervez Musharraf

Musharraf, who served as president of Pakistan from 2001–2008, died on February 5, 2023, after a long illness. Musharraf’s political career included many controversies, which culminated in his exile to Dubai in 2016. He wrote In the Line of Fire in 2006 during the height of the U.S. War on Terror, and it covers relevant topics like the hunt for Osama bin Laden as well as Musharraf’s political journey and ideals.

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Europa, Europa by Solomon Perel

Many Jews survived the Holocaust by forging papers that claimed they weren’t Jewish, but few joined the Nazi regime like Perel and had to hide their identity as vigilantly. Perel’s remarkable memoir was adapted into the Golden Globe-winning film Europa Europa. He died February 2, 2023, at 97 years old.

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Hawke by Ted Bell

Bell’s thriller is a fun, over-the-top homage to Ian Fleming and James Bond. This debut follows Lord Alexander Hawke, the wealthy descendant of the pirate Blackhawke, as he tries to thwart a terrorist attack on the U.S. from Cuban agitators. Before becoming a bestselling fiction writer, Bell was vice chairman and worldwide creative director of the advertising agency Leo Burnett U.S.A. Bell passed away January 20, 2023, due to a stroke.

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The Night Ocean by Paul La Farge

The Night Ocean is for fans of H.P. Lovecraft and fandom itself, as La Farge imagines what Lovecraft’s relationship with one of his younger fans, Robert Barlow, may have been like. There’s mystery layered on top of mystery, history seamlessly weaved with fiction, in this loving, literary masterwork. La Farge died January 18, 2023, from cancer.

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Passage to Juneau by Jonathan Raban

The only thing late author and critic Raban loved as much as writing was seeing the world. His passions blended beautifully in travelogs like Passage to Juneau. Published in 1999, this book chronicles the author’s solo sailing voyage from Seattle to Alaska and includes discoveries of new places and experiences along with Raban’s personal reflections on family, loss, and legacy. Raban passed away on January 17, 2023.

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Churchill by Paul Johnson

“Of all the towering figures of the 20th century, both good and evil, Winston Churchill was the most valuable to humanity, and the most likable,” Paul Johnson writes in this slim biography of the esteemed UK Prime Minister. Johnson, a British historian, wrote more than 50 books with reverence on a wide variety of subjects. He died January 12, 2023, at age 94.

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The World Doesn't End by Charles Simic

“Words make love on the page like flies in the summer heat and the poet is merely the bemused spectator,” said Simic, a Pulitzer-winning poet and former Poet Laureate who died on January 9, 2023, at 84 years old. Simic came of age in war-torn Yugoslavia before immigrating to the U.S., and those early childhood experiences likely fueled his work, which is often bleak and always thought-provoking.

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Cloudsplitter by Russell Banks

Banks was best known for writing about ordinary people and relatable struggles, with his characters often being the working class and immigrants. Cloudsplitter is a fictionalized history of American abolitionist John Brown, whom Banks called a “powerful resonant figure.” Banks passed away on January 7, 2023, at age 82 after a battle with cancer.

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Weldon (September 22, 1931 – January 4, 2023) was an English author and feminist whose books represented women as authentic human beings rather than the female archetypes seen in pop culture. One of her most popular novels, The Life and Loves of a She Devil, follows a housewife who tries to take revenge on her unfaithful husband and his mistress. It was adapted into a BBC series and a film (She-Devil) starring Meryl Streep.

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How to Fall: Stories by Edith Pearlman

Pearlman was always a literary darling for her pointed short stories, but she became a full-blown literary sensation later in life when she was nominated for the National Book Award for Fiction in 2011. How to Fall, like many of Pearlman’s short story collections, draws from her experiences growing up Jewish in New England. Pearlman passed away January 1, 2023, at the age of 86.

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About the Author: Lanie Pemberton

Lanie is a San Diego-based freelance writer who loves reading crime thrillers and nonfiction about animals and the natural world. When not writing and reading (or writing about what to read), Lanie spends as much time as possible at the beach with her husband and pampered pittie, Peach.