Novelist Almudena Grandes, who made her name with an erotic novel but later won plaudits for writing on Spain's recent history, died Saturday, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez announced.

Born in Madrid in 1960, Grandes was a writer and columnist who made her name with the erotic novel "Las edades de Lulu" (The Ages of Lulu) which caused a scandal but was also very successful, winning a her prize for erotic fiction.

Moving on from the erotic genre, she wrote "Te llamaré viernes" (1991), a love story between marginalised people in a hostile Madrid, and three years later "Malena es un nombre de tango" (Malena is the Name of a Tango)(1994), a highly acclaimed novel in which she tackled one of her recurring themes: an imperfect girl rebelling against social norms to find her place in the world.

In 2010, she embarked on an ambitious six-volume project called "Episodios de una guerra interminable" (Episodes of an endless war), which deals with the post-civil war years in Spain. She was also a regular columnist for El Pais newspaper, and in a column published in mid-October, she wrote about being diagnosed with the cancer which would go on to kill her.

Read more: BARRON'S

See the news in english here: The New York Times InSpain.News