He was notably the author of the bestseller adapted to the cinema The Horse Whisperer. British writer Nicholas Evans died of a heart attack at the age of 72, his agent announced on Monday August 15.
His death took place on August 9, but was not made public until six days later in a statement: “United Agents is very sad to announce the passing of acclaimed author Nicholas Evans who died suddenly on Tuesday following a heart attack. »
A first novel and a huge success
Born in central England in 1950, Nicholas Evans studied law at Oxford before becoming a journalist, for the local press and then television. He is best known for his first novel which met with enormous success, The Horse Whisperer (The Horse Whisperer), published in 1995 and sold fifteen million copies worldwide.
The novel tells the story of a young girl seriously injured in a riding accident, during which her best friend is killed and her animal mutilated. To save her daughter and renew the bond she established with her horse, her mother embarks on a last-ditch expedition to Montana, where the “whisperer” Tom Booker who has the reputation of treating the most difficult horses.
The book has been adapted for the cinema by Robert Redford, who is at the same time the director, the actor and the producer of this hymn to the great outdoors, to virgin nature and to horses. Released in 1998, the film with Scarlett Johansson and Kristin Scott Thomas was nominated for an Oscar, without winning any prizes. Nicholas Evans is also the author of circle of wolves (1998) or even Invisible wounds (2012).