Sept. 23 (UPI) -- Historical fiction writer Hilary Mantel has died at the age of 70.
"We are heartbroken at the death of our beloved author, Dame Hilary Mantel, and our thoughts are with her friends and family, especially her husband, Gerald," her publisher, 4th Estate Books, tweeted Friday.
"This is a devastating loss and we can only be grateful she left us with such a magnificent body of work."
Mantel is the only woman author to have earned the Booker Prize twice for Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies.
They were adapted as the popular BBC series, Wolf Hall, starring Mark Rylance, Damian Lewis and Claire Foy.
Her other works include The Mirror & The Light, Every Day is Mother's Day, Vacant Possession, Eight Months on Ghazzah Street, Fludd, A Place of Greater Safety, A Change of Climate, An Experiment in Love, The Giant, O'Brien, Beyond Black, Learning to Talk and The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher.
"It has been the greatest privilege to work with her through the whole of her career, and to see all the elements that made her unique come together spectacularly in The Wolf Hall Trilogy," Mantel's literaty agent, Bill Hamilton, said in a statement.
"Her wit, stylistic daring, creative ambition and phenomenal historical insight mark her out as one of the greatest novelists of our time. She will be remembered for her enormous generosity to other budding writers, her capacity to electrify a live audience, and the huge array of her journalism and criticism, producing some of the finest commentary on issues and books," Hamilton added.
"Emails from Hilary were sprinkled with bon mots and jokes as she observed the world with relish and pounced on the lazy or absurd and nailed cruelty and prejudice. There was always a slight aura of otherworldliness about her, as she saw and felt things us ordinary mortals missed, but when she perceived the need for confrontation she would fearlessly go into battle. And all of that against the backdrop of chronic health problems, which she dealt with so stoically. We will miss her immeasurably, but as a shining light for writers and readers she leaves an extraordinary legacy."
She is survived by her husband Gerald McEwen.