Sunday night, July 26, true crime author Ann Rule passed away in a Seattle area hospital. Following a fall in 2013 the author’s health had been steadily declining over the last few years and according to correspondence between the Seattle P.I. and daughter Leslie Rule she ultimately died of pneumonia and congestive heart failure.

On July 19 Rule was admitted to Highline Medical Center’s Intensive Care Unit with pneumonia.

Rule began her writing career after working as a Seattle Police officer in the late 1960’s. For years she was regularly published in True Detective Magazine and was their Northwest correspondent. It was during these years that she wrote under the pseudonym “Andy Stack” to give the impression she was a male author. She covered over 800 cases between Seattle and northern California for the magazine throughout the 70’s.

Her big break came in 1980 when she published the now infamous The Stranger Beside Me, a book chronicling the serial killings of Ted Bundy. The book and Rule’s account is singular from any other written on Bundy since she had been friends with him and worked with him at a crisis hotline years before he was discovered to be a serial killer.

While writing her book Bundy regularly wrote letters to Rule from jail and believed their friendship to be destined or “karmic”. For years after he was executed Rule was regularly contacted by people wanting a sample of Bundy’s handwriting.

Following her first success Rule wrote many novels throughout the decades up until recently, primarily in the true crime genre and often centered in the Northwest. Other notable titles include The I-5 Killer, Small Sacrifices, and The Want-Ad Killer. Her last book was 2013’s Practice to Deceive which covered a 2003 murder that occurred on Whidbey Island.

The Library of America selected her piece “Young Love” to be included in their retrospective book True Crime: An American Anthology.

In her personal life Rule lived in the Normandy Park area and had four children; two daughters, Leslie and Laura, and two sons, Michael and Andrew.

In the last few months Rule was in the headlines due to abuse she was receiving from her two sons and allegations that they had been stealing money from her estate for years. There is no word yet on the state of those cases following her death.

According to the Seattle P.I. Rule was visited by all of her children and grandchildren before she died. She was 83-years-old at the time of her death.