Author LJ Smith, whose best-selling Vampire Diaries novels were turned into a hit TV show, has died at the age of 66. Lisa Jane Smith published the original four-book series, about a love triangle involving two vampire brothers and an orphaned young woman,

LJ Smith, the author whose bestselling Vampire Diaries novels were adapted into a hit TV show, has died aged 66. The New York Times reports that the bestselling author died on March 8 in Walnut Creek, Calif, after suffering effects of a rare autoimmune disease for a decade.

Lisa Jane Smith "L.J. Smith," the author of the Vampire Diaries book series, died on Saturday, March 8, at 66 years old in Walnut Creek, California. Smith's partner, Julie Divola, as well as her sister, Judy Clifford, told the New York Times she "died in a hospital after enduring the cascading effects of a rare autoimmune disease for a decade."