Frederick Forsyth, the author of The Day of The Jackal, has died at the age of 86 after a brief illness, his literary agents have announced.
The best-selling author was surrounded by his family as he died at home on Monday morning, Curtis Brown added.
Jonathan Lloyd, his agent, said: "We mourn the passing of one of the world's greatest thriller writers.
"Only a few weeks ago I sat with him as we watched a new and moving documentary of his life - In My Own Words, to be released later this year on BBC1 - and was reminded of an extraordinary life, well lived.
"After serving as one of the youngest ever RAF pilots, he turned to journalism, using his gift for languages in German, French and Russian to become a foreign correspondent in Biafra.
"Appalled at what he saw and using his experience during a stint as a secret service agent, he wrote his first and perhaps most famous novel, The Day of the Jackal (1972), and instantly became a global bestselling author.
"He went on to write more than 25 books (many of which were made into films) that have sold over 75 million copies.
"He will be greatly missed by his family, his friends, all of us at Curtis Brown and of course his millions of fans around the world - though his books will of course live on forever."
Born in Kent in 1938, Forsyth was an RAF pilot before becoming a war correspondent for the BBC and Reuters, and revealed in 2015 he also worked for British intelligence agency MI6 for more than 20 years.
Many of his fictional plots for his thriller novels drew on his real-life experiences around the world.
He made his name with his first novel, The Day Of The Jackal, which he wrote when he was out of work.
"[I was] skint, in debt, no flat, no car, no nothing and I just thought, 'How do I get myself out of this hole?' And I came up with probably the zaniest solution - write a novel," he said when once describing how he becmae an author.
The gripping tale, set in 1963, tells the story of an Englishman hired to assassinate the French president at the time, Charles de Gaulle.
The Day Of The Jackal was turned into a 1973 film starring Edward Fox as the Jackal, and then became a TV drama starring Eddie Redmayne last year.
