Steamy romance novelistJudith Krantz dies at 91

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Writer Judith Krantz, whose million-selling novels such as “Scruples” and “Princess Daisy” engrossed readers worldwide with their steamy tales of the rich and beautiful, died Saturday at her Bel-Air home. She was 91.

Krantz’s son Tony Krantz, a TV executive, confirmed her death by natural causes on Sunday afternoon. He said he’d hoped to re-create the “Scruples” miniseries before her she died but it is still in the works.

“She had this rare combination of commercial and creative,” he said.

Krantz wrote for Cosmopolitan and Ladies Home Journal magazines before discovering, at age 50, the talent for fiction that made her rich and famous like the characters she created.

Her first novel — “Scruples” in 1978 — became a best-seller, as did the nine that followed. Krantz’s books have been translated into 52 languages and sold more than 85 million copies worldwide. They inspired a series of hit miniseries with the help of her husband, film and television producer Steve Krantz.

The eldest of three children, Krantz was born Judith Bluma Tarcher in 1928 in New York City. Her father owned an advertising agency, and her mother worked as an attorney. Her brother, publisher Jeremy Tarcher, married the late ventriloquist Shari Lewis.

Growing up, Krantz was a precocious student at New York’s exclusive Birch Wathen school, once describing herself as the youngest, smartest and shortest girl in her class. After skipping two grades, she enrolled at Wellesley College at age 16.

She was also by her own account an indifferent college student. She said she only enrolled at Wellesley “to date, read and graduate” and claimed to have set a record for her dorm by once dating 13 different men on 13 consecutive evenings.

Woody Guthrie’s kids named Mermaid Parade king, queen

NEW YORK (AP) — Woody Guthrie’s children, Arlo and Nora Guthrie, are king and queen of this year’s Coney Island Mermaid Parade.

Saturday’s colorful spectacle of participants in zany aquatic costumes ushered in the New York summer for the 37th time.

This year, the corner of Mermaid Avenue and West 35th Street in Brooklyn is being named Woody Guthrie Way.

The songwriter famous for “This Land is Your Land” and his wife moved into a modest first-floor apartment on Mermaid Avenue in 1943, and that’s where the siblings grew up.

Arlo is famous singer-songwriter in his own right, most famous for “Alice’s Restaurant.”

The parade was founded in 1983 to promote the historic amusement park district and what Coney Island advocate Dick Zigun calls its “wacky art.”

The parade now has a global following and is staged each year on the Saturday closest to the summer solstice.