Hillel Italie | Associated Press

Prize-winning fiction writer Deesha Philyaw, who struggled to find a publisher for what became her acclaimed debut “The Secret Lives of Church Ladies,” has a 7-figure deal for her next two books.

Prize-winning poet Gerald Stern has died at age 97 in New York City. A Pittsburgh native, Stern was one of the country's most loved and respected poets who wrote with spirited melancholy and earthly humor about his childhood, Judaism, mortality and the contemplative life.

David McCullough, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author whose lovingly crafted narratives on subjects ranging from the Brooklyn Bridge to Presidents John Adams and Harry Truman made him among the most popular and influential historians of his time, has died. He was 89.