The British author Sophie Kinsella, known for the popular Shopaholicseries, passed away on Wednesday morning at the age of 55. This was announced via the writer’s Instagram account. “We are deeply saddened to announce the passing of our beloved Sophie (aka Maddy, aka Mummy),” the family said. “She died peacefully, spending her last days surrounded by the things she loved: family, music, warmth, Christmas and joy. We cannot imagine what life will be like without her radiant personality and zest for life.”
Kinsella, whose real name was Madeleine Sophie Wickham, announced in April 2024 that she had been struggling with an aggressive form of brain cancer for some time. “I did not share this earlier because I wanted to ensure that my children could hear and process the news in peace and adapt to our ‘new normal’,” was her message at the time.
Wickham, who was born in London in 1969, initially studied music at New College, Oxford, but soon exchanged this study for philosophy, political science and economics. After graduating, she worked as a financial journalist, a job she didn’t like, after which she started writing. Her 1995 debut, The Tennis Partywhich she published under her own name, received good reviews in the United Kingdom and encouraged her to continue writing. Six other books followed, including The Gatecrasher (Sweet Tears, 1998) and Sleeping Arrangements (Sleepless nights, 2001).
These first books, consisting of often composed stories with different characters, Wickham mentioned in a conversation with The Guardian “a bit more serious, a bit darker” than her later work. In 2000 she started working under the name Sophie Kinsella Shopaholicseries. The main character is Becky Bloomwood, a twenty-something who works as a financial journalist but is up to her ears in debt due to a shopping addiction. She loses herself in an exhausting correspondence with various debt collection agencies and struggles with love. This novel, titled Shopaholic! – to be read as a humorous warning against the risks of debt – became one instant success, after which many more titles followed.
Just like the novels of Helen Fielding, author of the Bridget Jonesseries, became the Shopaholicbooks were then quickly classified as ‘chick lit’, because of the romantic and hilarious situations in which her heroines find themselves. A term that the writer herself said she had no objection to, because, according to Wickham, ‘intelligence’ and ‘clumsiness’ go well together. In an interview with NRC in 2007, she also called it “nonsense” that the popularity of chick lit would prevent female writers from attempting a serious book. “Everyone has a different story to tell, and their own form in which it fits best. For me, that happens to be the light-hearted, humorous form. And that is very popular, yes. But it is unlikely that this is at the expense of serious literature. As far as I am concerned, there is room for both, for serious literature and lighter reading, for Becky Bloomwood and Anna Karenina.”
Next to her Shopaholicseries, the first two parts of which were filmed under the name in 2009 Confessions of a ShopaholicWickham also wrote children’s books and young adult books. Her books have sold more than 45 million copies worldwide and have been translated into dozens of languages. She leaves behind a husband and five children.
NEW: Give this item as a gift
As an NRC subscriber you can subscribe every month 10 items give as a gift to someone without an NRC subscription. The recipient can read the article directly, without a paywall.
The journalistic principles of NRC