Chinua Achebe has died aged 82 in Boston. Born in 1930 in Nigeria he studied literature and medicine. After graduating he worked for the Nigeria Broadcasting Company, eventually becoming the Director. His first novel titled, Things Fall Apart was published in 1958 and has since sold 8 million copies and has been translated in 50 different languages. He went to America in 1966 and taught at the University of Massachusetts and the University of Connecticut, ending his teaching career as Professor of Africana Studies at Brown University. From his first novel he went on to have 4 other novels published, 8 collections of short stories, 6 collections of poetry, 8 works of non-fiction that include essays and political commentary, and 4 books for children. In 2007 he was awarded The Man Booker International Prize.

The much enjoyed writer Barbara Anderson has died aged 86. She began writing in her later life after a career of teaching. Her first book of short stories titled, I think We Should Go into the Jungle was published in 1993. This was followed by seven novels, and two collections of short stories, that included, All the Nice Girls, published in 1995 and Long Hot Summer, published in 1999. Her autobiography, titled Getting There: an autobiography was published in 2008.

The well-know and much admired horror writer James Herbert has died aged 69 years.
Born in London in 1943 he began writing at the age of 28. His first book, a disaster novel titled The Rats was published in 1974 and his writing was continual, producing a novel nearly every year, with a total of 23 novels along with a number of short stories. Over 54 million copies of his novels were sold world wide and were translated into 34 languages. James Herbert also designed his own book covers. Five of his novels were adapted into film, with The Rats also being made into a computer game. His last novel, Ash was published in 2012.