David E. Davis, Jr., former editor and publisher of Car and Driver and Automobile. (LAT obit.)
When I was in high school, I read the Davis Car and Driver religiously. It was full of great stuff: road tests of radar detectors, explanations of why the 55 MPH speed limit was wrong, my first exposure to P.J. O’Rourke (“Ferrari Refutes the Decline of the West”, which is still one of my favorite pieces of writing in, like, ever), Patrick Bedard…the list goes on.
Eighty’s a pretty good run for a guy who destroyed his face in an M.G. crash. Rest in peace, Mr. Davis. I hope you’re driving something fast on heaven’s equivalent of the Nürburgring.
This has been noted elsewhere, but here’s the NYT obit for Diana Wynne Jones. (Edited to add: here’s a short but nice tribute from Michael Dirda in the WP.)
Edited to add 2: Bill Crider had these first, but the deaths of Farley Granger and the mystery writer H.R.F. Keating are being reported. I’ll have more to say after better obits are published.