Helen Dunmore, poet and novelist

Ms Dunmore had written about her condition in March in a piece entitled Facing Mortality And What We Leave Behind.

She said she had been diagnosed with a cancer with “a very poor prognosis”.

“The ground beneath my feet has never been more uncertain, but what is sure is that the ambulance has already called and there is no vagueness about my mortality,” she said.

Ms Dunmore was born in Beverley, the second of four children, while her father, who was in the RAF, was stationed in the area.

Her mother was originally from Manchester and her father from nearby Stockport, although his work meant the family moved around the country as she was growing up.

“It’s quite hard for me to imagine being born in one place and growing up there,” she had said.

While her parents and siblings briefly emigrated to America, she studied for a degree in English at York University.

She published her first poetry collection, The Apple Fall, in 1983.

She won several accolades for her work including the McKitterick Prize for her 1993 debut novel Zennor In Darkness and the Orange Prize for her gothic novel, A Spell Of Winter (1995), set before the outbreak of the First World War.

Another tale set in the aftermath of war, the 2012 ghost story The Greatcoat, was set in Yorkshire in the late 1940s.

Her 2010 novel, The Betrayal, was longlisted for the Man Booker prize.

Her latest book, Birdcage Walk, was published this year.

She is survived by her husband Francis Charnley, and her children and stepchildren Patrick, Tess and Ollie.