Rice, Anne, 1941-2021, American novelist, b. New Orleans, La., as Howard Katherine O'Brien, San Francisco State Univ. (B.A., 1964; M.A., 1972). Rice was raised in New Orleans until her mother died when she 15; her father remarried and the family moved to Texas, where she briefly attended Texas Woman's Univ. She moved to San Francisco, and completed her college education, earning a degree in political science. In 1972, her daughter died of leukemia, inspiring her to write what became her first novel, Interview with a Vampire (1976), which became a major best-seller and spawned over a dozen more novels under the overall title of the Vampire Chronicles, a film adaptation, and a Broadway musical scored by Elton John. She has had a troubled relationship with the Christian church, alternating disavowing organized religion while embracing spirituality, a subject of many of her books. She wrote a variety of other novels, some under the pseudonyms of Anne Rampling and A.N. Roquelaure. Her novels are said to have sold over 150 million copies, making her among the best-selling of all American authors.
See her memoir, Called Out of Darkness: A Spiritual Journey (2008).
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