Dame Hilary Mantel, author of the best-selling Wolf Hall trilogy, has died aged 70, her publisher has confirmed. She won the Booker Prize twice, for 2009’s Wolf Hall, the first in the Thomas Cromwell series, and its 2012 sequel Bring Up the Bodies.
In a statement, her publisher said that they are heartbroken at the death of their beloved author, Dame Hilary Mantel.
HarperCollins said Dame Hilary had died suddenly yet peacefully on Thursday, surrounded by family and friends.
Wolf Hall was a fictional account of Thomas Cromwell’s rise to power in the court of Henry VIII.
The third and final book in the series, The Mirror and the Light, was published in 2020 to much critical acclaim, became a fiction best-seller and was longlisted for The Booker Prize 2020.
The trilogy sold more than five million copies globally and has been translated into 41 languages.