'Rivals' and 'Riders' author Jilly Cooper dies aged 88 after fall 

Author Jilly Cooper has died aged 88. Picture: Lucy Ray/PA

Jilly Cooper, the author of “bonkbusters” including Rivals, Riders and Polo, has died after a fall at the age of 88.

Her children, Felix and Emily, said her death on Sunday morning has come as a “complete shock”.

A statement said: “Mum was the shining light in all of our lives. Her love for all of 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.”

Ms Cooper was best known for her books in The Rutshire Chronicles, featuring the showjumping lothario Rupert Campbell-Black.

One of the books, Rivals, was recently adapted for television by Disney+. The adaptation featured Irish actors Aidan Turner and Victoria Smurfit as well as David Tennant and Alex Hassell, who starred as Rupert.

Her agent Felicity Blunt said: “The privilege of my career has been working with a woman who has defined culture, writing and conversation since she was first published over fifty years ago.

“Jilly will undoubtedly be best remembered for her chart-topping series The Rutshire Chronicles and its havoc-making and handsome show-jumping hero Rupert Campbell-Black.

Dame Jilly Cooper (Lucy North/PA)

“You wouldn’t expect books categorised as bonkbusters to have so emphatically stood the test of time but Jilly wrote with acuity and insight about all things — class, sex, marriage, rivalry, grief and fertility.

“Her plots were both intricate and gutsy, spiked with sharp observations and wicked humour. She regularly mined her own life for inspiration and there was something Austenesque about her dissections of society, its many prejudices and norms. But if you tried to pay her this compliment, or any compliment, she would brush it aside.

“She wrote, she said, simply ‘to add to the sum of human happiness’. In this regard as a writer she was and remains unbeatable.

“In her last few years Jilly added to her curriculum vitae by serving as an executive producer on the Happy Prince adaptation of her novel Rivals for Disney+. Her suggestions for story and dialogue inevitably layered and enhanced scripts and her presence on set was a joy for cast and crew alike.

“Emotionally intelligent, fantastically generous, sharply observant and utter fun Jilly Cooper will be deeply missed by all at Curtis Brown and on the set of Rivals.

“I have lost a friend, an ally, a confidante and a mentor. But I know she will live forever in the words she put on the page and on the screen.”