Melissa Shapiro, who under the pseudonym M.J. Rose wrote novels rich in jewelry detail and expertise, died on Dec. 10. She was 71.
Shapiro is said to have died unexpectedly while visiting her father at his home in Florida. No further information was available at press time about cause of death.
In last year’s The Jeweler of Stolen Dreams, Rose fictionalized the life of designer Suzanne Belperron. She told JCK in an interview when the novel was published: “What I find so fascinating and endlessly curious about jewelry is that each piece takes on the patina of not only its maker but each of its owners. Passed down from generation to generation or sold, pawned or stolen, there are endless tales that every ring, pair of earrings, necklace, brooch could tell.”
Jewels were a regular topic in M.J. Rose books, and the author loved to research gemstones and designers. Her other novels include Cartier’s Hope, Tiffany Blues, The Last Tiara, and The Secret Language of Stones.
In all, Rose wrote more than 15 novels as well as three books on marketing. She made the best-seller lists of The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and USA Today, selling more than 1.5 million books, according to her online bio. Her work has been published in more than 30 countries.
Marion Fasel, editorial director of jewelry website The Adventurine, paid tribute to her friend Rose, who was a contributing writer for the blog: “Recently, she took a group of wildly successful romance novelists to Paris and told me about the delightful antics shopping at Dior, Chanel, and Van Cleef & Arpels, where they absolutely hoovered up the inventory.
“M.J. joined in the festivities a bit, but she admired independent jewelry design above all. During a break from the group, she not only managed to get into the legendary jewelry boutique JAR, but somehow charmed the notoriously difficult designer Joel Arthur Rosenthal, who famously turns some would-be clients away. M.J. told him she didn’t have a big budget, but it was her dream to have one of his jewels. He agreed to the commission and the design was in the works. She planned to travel to Paris in the spring to pick it up.”
Rose was a founding member of International Thriller Writers and founder of the marketing company AuthorBuzz. She co-created (with Liz Berry and Jillian Stein) 1001 Dark Nights and its imprint Blue Box Press, which published a series of novellas that retell stories from the Arabian Nights as contemporary or paranormal romance tales.
On 1001 Dark Nights’ Facebook page, Berry and Stein posted a statement: “It is with profound sadness that we announce the sudden and untimely passing of our dear friend and business partner M.J. Rose. We are completely shocked and heartbroken and we will miss her beyond measure. Please keep M.J.’s friends and family in your thoughts during this difficult time.”
Friends and associates remember Rose as an advocate for authors and self-published writers, an entrepreneur, and a top-notch book marketer. Her first novel, Lip Service, which she self-published in 1998, is credited as the first e-book to eventually be released by a mainstream publishing house (Pocket Books).
“She taught me, and a lot of writers, an awful lot about the book business. She knew its ups and downs firsthand. She was a warrior, the kind you want to be in a foxhole with, the kind who watched your back and fought to the end,” author Steve Berry wrote on Facebook.
Novelist Stephanie Cowell posted: “To me, she was the voice of wisdom in this chaotic, unstable publishing industry and a good friend.… I loved our lunches in the lovely, old-world spots in the city and the time we went to look at impressionist garden paintings at the Met. She had also been a painter, and we looked at things in rapture as we talked of what she saw.”
Friend and author Christopher Rice said on Instagram: “M.J. was hilarious, brilliant, and elegant. She insisted on style when others defaulted to sterility. She could make you see a world of infinite wonders in a single jeweled necklace, and she could tell a hypnotic and seductive tale about a single bottle of perfume.… New York won’t be the same without her.”
A number of people have bookmarked a quote from Rose’s The Collector of Dying Breaths—“The dead live as long as someone who loves them lives”—on reading websites such as Goodreads, showing their admiration of the writer.
Before she became a published author, Shapiro worked in advertising, including a nine-year stint as creative director at Rosenfeld, Sirowitz & Lawson. She was a 1976 graduate of Syracuse University.
Shapiro is survived by her husband, the composer Doug Scofield. The couple, who had been married for a reported 30 years, lived in Greenwich, Conn. No information was available on burial or services.
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