Family pays tribute as Jilly Cooper dies at 88: ‘Her unexpected death has come as a complete shock’

Jilly Cooper, the author of the Rutshire Chronicles, has died. She was 88.

The news was announced on Monday (6 October), with her publisher releasing a statement which said: “It is with great sadness that we announce the death of Dame Jilly Cooper, DBE, who died on Sunday morning, after a fall,” Sky News reported.

Cooper’s children, Felix and Emily, described their mother as “the shining light in all of our lives”, and went on to say: “Her love her family and friends knew no bounds. Her unexpected death has come as a complete shock.

“We are so proud of everything she achieved in her life and can’t begin to imagine life without her infectious smile and laughter all around us.”

Felicity Blunt, Cooper’s agent, told the BBC, it had been a privilege to work with “a woman who has defined culture, writing and conversation since she was first published over 50 years ago.” She praised the author – fondly known as the Queen of the Bonkbuster – for writing with “acuity and insight about all things: class, sex, marriage, rivalry, grief and fertility,” and for crafting “intricate and gutsy plots spiked with sharp observations and wicked humour”.

Over the course of her career, Cooper sold more than 11 million copies of her books. Rivals, the second of her famous Rutshire Chronicles series, was most recently adapted into a Disney+ series starring David Tennant, Danny Dyer and Aidan Turner.

The eight-part drama – packed with sex, scandal and plenty of nudity – followed several socially elite couples, including gay lovers Charles Fairburn and Gerald Middleton.

In the novel, Charles is the implied gay head of religious programming at Lord Tony Baddingham’s commercial television network. But that was changed for the TV series to make his homosexuality more explicit. Work on a second season is currently underway.

Before turning to writing novels, Jilly Cooper was a journalist. She wrote a lifestyle column, occasionally about sex, for The Sunday Times and later worked for the Mail on Sunday before writing books such as How to Stay Married, published in 1969, and How to Survive from Nine to Five the following year.

But she found more fame when she moved into writing romantic fiction with the likes of Riders, Rivals, Polo and, more-recently, Mount! and Tackle!

In 2018, she faced criticism for her saying the #MeToo movement had led to straight men to having gay affairs.

“You can’t flirt any more, it is so sad,” she was quoted as saying. “You have a mini skirt up to here, then ‘do not touch’ tattooed across your knees… men cry all the time now… and they have beards.”

Cooper was appointed OBE in 2004 and Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 2024’s New Years Honours list.

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