The world of the thriller is in mourning. The disappearance on Friday of Mary Higgins Clark at the age of 92 has greatly affected the stars of the genre. We contacted Harlan Coben, a close friend of the American author, as well as Guillaume Musso and Marc Levy, two of the best-selling writers in France, to let us know their reaction.
Harlan Coben: "Mary was simply the best"
" My heart is broken. Mary was simply the best. Writer, of course, but also the dearest friend you can have. We live a few kilometers from each other, we were really close. She taught me so much in writing but also in life in general. She was so generous, always there to help you when you needed her.
Without Mary, I would not have arrived where I am. She was a very hard worker and when I give up when writing a novel, I think of her and go back to my desk! Mary loved people and life despite the tragedies that she lived, including that of being widowed with five children so young. She was very close to her readers, she loved meeting them, talking with them, answering their questions. She illuminated with her presence all the places where she went. "
Guillaume Musso: "Forever engraved in my memory"
“I discovered Mary Higgins Clark around 14 or 15 years old with La Nuit du Renard. It was my mother, librarian, who advised me, assuring me that this novel would succeed in frightening me. The teenager that I was then looked at him a bit doubtful. And yet it was she who was right! Released in France in 1979, this novel, which was wildly modern for the time, helped to renew the genre of the thriller. Ultra-fluid style, tense narrative, multitude of looks and points of view, relentless mechanics ...
It has often been said abusively of certain novels that they were impossible to close after having opened the last page. For La Nuit du Renard , it's true! You are caught up as rarely, plunged in apnea, prisoner of a terrifying climate. I am far from having read all of Mary Higgins Clark's novels, but the memory of this first discovery will forever remain in my memory as a reader. "
Marc Levy: "It was The Queen"
“When I was a young writer, I found myself at a table with Sydney Pollack, Jacqueline Bisset and Mary Higgins Clark. I was immediately won over by her humor, her kindness and her sense of self-deprecation. She was happy, she was a good living. I also remember his incredible mastery of the trade.
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She was a huge professional but full of humility. She was kind and very generous especially in her relationship with her readership which was not at all based on a fan-idol report. I listened to them speak during dedications and I had the impression that his readers belonged to his novels. His career was exemplary and his life was exemplary. She had the title of Queen of suspense but for me, she was much more, she was simply The Queen. "
