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James Herbert has died aged 69 :(
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From the Telegraph,
Tributes poured in overnight for the British horror writer James Herbert, who died yesterday.
Crime writer Ian Rankin tweeted: “ Sad news about James Herbert – as a teen, I scared myself silly reading him. He led me to King, Barker, others. RIP ...”
Speaking on Radio 5 Live last night, Neil Gaiman, bestselling author and friend of Herbert, said: “His first book was a bestseller, which is something that happens to very few writers. He had to do all his growing up in public. He had to learn to write in public.
“Jim’s [sales] numbers were extraordinary and he was very grumpy that nobody noticed. He’d point out that he had outsold Stephen King in the UK. He was a bestselling author which I think also meant that he felt he wasn’t getting the attention that he deserved. He wanted the things he wasn’t getting. He wanted critical acclaim and I don’t think he felt he ever got it even when some of his novels did get serious critical attention.
“He was always incredibly encouraging. When Terry Pratchett and I wrote our first novel together, Good Omens, my first novel, he gave me a blurb for it, said something about how incredibly funny and wonderful it was. A few years later, on a panel, he was recorded as saying that, long after he had given the blurb, he picked up the book and read it, and was delighted to find out that it was actually as good as the blurb he had given it, which I think shows something rather sweet about Jim. That he would have had the confidence in me, and assumed that the book would be funny and later discovered that it was. And he had the humility to tell the world.”