Obits

A memorial for book publisher Merloyd Lawrence, who died in June, will take place on Saturday October 22 at 2 PM at King’s Chapel in Boston. It will also be livestreamed.

British-Canadian crime novelist Peter Robinson, 72, has died. Robinson’s novels include In a Dry Season  (2000), Playing with Fire (2005), Strange Affair (2006), and Piece of My Heart (2007). Jared Bland, outgoing publisher at McClelland & Stewart, who published Robinson’s work for over 20 years, said: “Peter Robinson was an  incredibly gifted writer and a lovely man, and we’re all deeply saddened by his loss. Peter’s  novels, especially his enduring Inspector Banks series, are the kinds of books that transcend their  genre—they’re crime novels, to be sure, but more than that they’re human novels, anchored by an immensely humane character. Banks […]

Chief book buyer at Politics & Prose Mark Laframboise died this week. According to the store’s Facebook page, he joined Politics & Prose as a bookseller nearly 25 years ago and was promoted to the top buying position 11 years ago. He served as president of the board of the New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association. On Facebook, owners Brad Graham and Lissa Muscatine wrote, “It is hard to imagine not seeing Mark hunched at his computer, with a publisher rep at his side, going through his buys for the next season. It is hard to imagine the floor without Mark […]

Booker-prize winning novelist Hilary Mantel, 70, died of a stroke on Thursday at a hospital in Exeter, England. Her agent Bill Hamilton said to the New York Times, “She had so many great novels ahead of her” and noted that she’d been working on a new one. The author of the celebrated Thomas Cromwell trilogy, Mantel won the Booker for both Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies, and was longlisted for The Mirror and the Light. Joan Fusco, 83, former manager, remainders & overstocks at Abrams, died on September 14 after a stroke. Fusco joined the company in 2000. […]

Spanish novelist Javier Marías, 70, died at his home on Sunday. He’d been suffering from pneumonia. Marías’ 15 books include the Your Face Tomorrow trilogy, A Heart So White, and All Souls.

Peter Straub, 79, author of numerous horror, thriller, and fantasy novels, died on September 5. Titles included Ghost Story, Koko, The Throat, Black House, and many more. Straub is survived by his wife Susan Bitker and their two children, Ben and author and Books Are owner Magic Emma Straub. “Peter was a wizard on the page,” says Doubleday vp, executive editor Lee Boudreaux, who edited Black House among other titles. “Among his many gifts, Peter transported readers on labyrinthine journeys as notable for their literary heft and devilishly clever dialogue as they were for Peter’s boundary-shattering imagination—and capacity to scare […]