Mary Higgins Clark (born Mary Theresa Eleanor Higgins; December 24, 1927 – January 31, 2020) was an American author who wrote suspense novels. She wrote 51 books, all of which were best-selling in the United States and several European countries. As of 2015, all her novels were still available for sale, and her first suspense novel, Where Are the Children?, had been printed 75 times.

Higgins Clark began writing stories when she was young. Before becoming an author, she worked as a secretary and copy editor. She also spent a year as a flight attendant for Pan-American Airlines before getting married and starting a family. To help support her family, she wrote short stories. After her husband passed away in 1964, she wrote four-minute radio scripts for many years. Her agent later encouraged her to try writing novels. Her first novel, which was a story based on the life of George Washington, did not sell well. She then focused on writing suspense novels, which became very popular. These books have sold more than 100 million copies in the United States alone. Mary Higgins Clark’s former daughter-in-law, Mary Jane Clark, and her daughter, Carol Higgins Clark, are also writers.

Early life

Mary Theresa Eleanor Higgins was born in New York City on December 24, 1927. Some sources incorrectly say 1929. She was the second child and only daughter of Nora C. (Durkin) and Luke Joseph Higgins. Her father was an Irish immigrant, and her mother was American-born, also of Irish heritage. The 1940 U.S. Census listed her age as 12 in April, which confirms her birth year as 1927.

She was born about one and a half years after her older brother, Joseph. Her younger brother, John, was born three years later. As a young child, she enjoyed writing. She wrote her first poem at age seven and created short plays for her friends to perform. She began keeping a journal at seven, writing in her first entry, "Nothing much happened today."

The family earned money from their Irish pub and lived comfortably, owning a home in the Bronx and a summer cottage near Long Island Sound. The Great Depression started when Mary was a baby, but her family was not immediately affected. They even gave food to men who came to their door looking for work. By the time Mary was ten, however, the family faced financial problems because many customers could not pay their bar bills. Her father had to lay off workers and work longer hours, spending little time at home. In 1939, when Mary was 12, she returned from church to learn that her father had died in his sleep.

After her husband’s death, Nora Higgins, now a widow with three children, struggled to find work because few employers hired a 52-year-old woman who had not worked in over 14 years. To earn money, Mary moved out of her bedroom so her mother could rent it. Six months later, her older brother injured his foot and developed a serious infection called osteomyelitis. Mary and her mother prayed daily for his recovery, and neighbors donated blood for his treatments. Doctors feared the worst, but Joseph survived. Mary believed his recovery was due to their prayers.

After graduating from Saint Francis Xavier Grammar School, Mary received a scholarship to attend Villa Maria Academy, a school run by nuns from the Congregation de Notre Dame de Montreal. Her teachers encouraged her writing, though they were upset when she spent class time writing stories instead of focusing on lessons. At sixteen, she tried to publish a story in True Confessions, but it was rejected.

To help pay bills, Mary worked as a switchboard operator at the Shelton Hotel, where she listened to guests’ conversations. She later recalled eavesdropping on Tennessee Williams but said he rarely said anything interesting. On days off, she would look at clothes in store windows, imagining what she would wear when she became a famous writer.

Despite Mary’s efforts to support her family, her mother’s babysitting income was not enough, and the family lost their home, moving into a small three-room apartment. When Joseph graduated from high school in 1944, he joined the Navy to serve his country and help his mother pay bills. Six months later, he developed spinal meningitis and died. His death deeply saddened the family, but because he was Nora’s dependent, she received a life pension and no longer needed Mary’s help with expenses.

Early career

After Joseph passed away, Higgins Clark finished high school and went to Wood Secretarial School with help from a partial scholarship. The next year, she completed her classes and began working as a secretary for the head of the creative department in the internal advertising division at Remington Rand. She also took evening classes to learn more about advertising and promotion. Her skills and appearance caught the attention of her boss and others at the company, and her job grew to include writing catalog copy (alongside future novelist Joseph Heller) and modeling for company brochures with Grace Kelly, who was not yet famous.

Although she liked her job, Higgins Clark was inspired by a friend’s comment about the heat in Calcutta. She decided to become a flight attendant, like her friend. After difficult interviews, she earned a position as a stewardess for Pan American Airlines, even though she earned $5 less each week than she had as a secretary. Her boss at Remington Rand held a farewell dinner for her, and Higgins Clark invited her neighbor, Warren Clark, to join her. By the end of the evening, Warren suggested they marry after she worked as a stewardess for one year. Higgins Clark agreed to this unusual proposal.

In 1949, she worked on Pan Am’s international flights, traveling to Europe, Africa, and Asia. One flight was the last allowed into Czechoslovakia before the Iron Curtain closed. On another trip, she helped a four-year-old orphan leave the airplane and meet her adoptive mother, a moment shown on television.

After one year of flying, Higgins Clark ended her job on December 26, 1949, to marry Warren Clark. To stay busy, she took writing classes at NYU and formed a writing group with classmates. The group met weekly for nearly forty years. During each meeting, two members shared their latest work for twenty minutes, and the others gave feedback for three minutes each.

A professor at NYU advised the class to create story ideas by reading newspapers and asking questions like, “Suppose…?” and “What if…?” Higgins Clark still uses these questions today. For her first assignment, she wrote a short story called “Stowaway” about a flight attendant who finds a stowaway from Czechoslovakia. Her professor praised the story, but Higgins Clark struggled to find a publisher. In 1956, after six years and forty rejections, Extension Magazine agreed to buy the story for $100.

During these years, Higgins Clark and Warren had four children: Marilyn, Warren Jr., David, and Carol. Carol was named after the heroine in Higgins Clark’s story. After selling her first story, Higgins Clark began publishing more of her work. Through the writing group, she met an agent, Patricia Schartle Myrer, who helped her for twenty years. They became close friends, and Higgins Clark named her fifth child after Patricia. While Warren worked and Higgins Clark wrote, they encouraged their children to earn money. All five children later took acting and modeling jobs. Young Patty became a Gerber Baby, David appeared in a United Way ad, and Higgins Clark filmed a commercial for Fab laundry detergent. The ad aired during the I Love Lucy show, and the money earned helped her and Warren take a trip to Hawaii.

In 1959, Warren Clark was diagnosed with severe angina. He limited his activities as advised by his doctor but suffered three heart attacks in the next five years, each time leaving the hospital in worse health. After his final heart attack in 1964, Higgins Clark asked a friend who wrote radio scripts for job leads. The day she accepted a job writing the radio segment “Portrait of a Patriot,” Warren had a fatal heart attack. His mother, who was visiting, died at his bedside when she learned of his death. In one night, Higgins Clark lost both her husband and her mother-in-law.

Aspire to the Heavens

Higgins Clark’s first job as a radio scriptwriter required her to write 65 four-minute programs for the "Portrait of a Patriot" series. Her work was so good that she was soon asked to write for two other radio series. This experience of writing complete stories in four minutes helped Higgins Clark learn to write clearly and briefly, skills that are very important for writing suspense novels, which need to move the story forward with every paragraph. Even though her new job provided some security, money was limited at first because she was raising five children, aged five to thirteen, alone. For their first Christmas without Warren, Higgins Clark gave her children only personalized poems, as she could not afford other gifts.

By the late 1960s, the market for short stories had declined. The Saturday Evening Post, which had named Higgins Clark’s short story "Beauty Contest at Buckingham" one of its ten best stories in 1960, faced serious financial problems and stopped publishing fiction. Many popular women’s magazines also reduced or stopped publishing fiction, focusing instead on articles about self-help. Because her short stories could no longer be published, Higgins Clark’s agent suggested she try writing a full-length novel. Using her research and experience from the "Portrait of a Patriot" series, Higgins Clark spent three years writing a story based on the relationship between George and Martha Washington, titled Aspire to the Heavens. The book focuses on George Washington’s love for his home. Although it sold for only a small payment, its acceptance gave Higgins Clark confidence that she could complete a full-length book and find a publisher. The novel was not sold well when it was first released, and four months after its publication, Higgins Clark’s mother-in-law, Nora, passed away.

To ensure her children would not struggle financially, Higgins Clark decided they should receive good educations. To set an example, she enrolled at Fordham University at Lincoln Center in 1971 and graduated in 1979 with a bachelor’s degree in philosophy, earning the highest honor, summa cum laude. Her children followed her example. The two oldest, Marilyn and Warren, became judges. Patty works at the Mercantile Exchange in New York City. David is the president and CEO of Talk Marketing Enterprises, Inc., and Carol has written many popular suspense novels.

During this time, Higgins Clark became frustrated with her employer. Even though two of her children needed help paying for college, she left her job and joined two former coworkers to start their own company that wrote and sold radio scripts. To raise the $5,000 needed to start the business, Higgins Clark had to sell her engagement ring. For eight months, the company was not profitable, and she did not receive a salary, which made it harder for her family to manage financially.

Higgins Clark continued writing during these difficult times.

Suspense genre

Encouraged by her agent, Higgins Clark decided to write another book. She chose to return to suspense stories, a genre she had enjoyed as a child and which had helped her achieve early success as a short story writer. While she was writing this new story, her younger brother, Johnny, passed away, making her the only family member left. To cope with her sadness, Higgins Clark focused on her writing and completed the novel, Where Are the Children? Soon after finishing the book, Simon & Schuster agreed to buy it for $3,000. Three months later, in July 1974, Higgins Clark learned that the paperback rights to the novel had been sold for $100,000. This was the first time in many years that she did not have immediate financial concerns. Where Are the Children? became a bestseller and received positive reviews. Two years after its publication, Higgins Clark sold her second suspense novel for $1.5 million.

Since 2010, a Paris-based company called La Sabotière has been adapting some of Higgins Clark’s crime novels into television films. In October 2019, a partnership between Montreal-based Reel One Entertainment, U.S. producer Element 8 Entertainment, and La Sabotière began developing a series based on Higgins Clark’s crime novels. The first season of this series will be based on I’ll Be Seeing You, and Ilene Rosenzweig will work as a writer and executive producer on the project.

Other writings

Higgins Clark's first book about George Washington, Aspire to the Heavens, was changed to Mount Vernon Love Story and published again in 2002. That same year, her autobiography, Kitchen Privileges, was released. This book used the journals she kept throughout her life. In 2006, she announced she would publish her first children's book, a dream she had long wanted to fulfill. Ghost Ship was published by Simon & Schuster, the same company that published her suspense novels.

She wrote several mystery novels with Christmas themes alongside her daughter, Carol. These books were popular with readers, but some critics said they were not as good as her other works because they had a lighter tone compared to her solo writing.

Later life

Higgins Clark dated during the time after her husband died. She described her second marriage, which lasted from 1978 to 1986, to Raymond Ploetz as "disastrous" and had the marriage legally ended.

In 1996, she married John J. Conheeney after they met through her daughter, Patty. Conheeney died at the age of 89 on October 8, 2018. He was the former chief executive officer of Merrill Lynch Futures. The couple lived in Saddle River, New Jersey. (Higgins Clark first moved to New Jersey in 1956 when she and her first husband purchased a home in Washington Township, Bergen County, New Jersey.)

In 1981, Higgins Clark was in Washington, D.C., on the day President Ronald Reagan was shot. Because she had a press pass, she was allowed to join the media waiting to hear the President’s condition. When the doctor arrived to begin the press conference, Higgins Clark was one of the few people selected to ask a question.

In 2011, she was the Grand Marshal of the New York City St. Patrick’s Day Parade.

In addition to living in Saddle River, Higgins Clark owned homes in Manhattan, Dennis, Massachusetts, and Naples, Florida. She died in Naples on January 31, 2020, at the age of 92.

Success

Higgins Clark wrote more than 50 novels, and millions of copies of her books have been sold in the United States.

In 2001, the hardcover version of her book On the Street Where You Live was the top-selling book on the New York Times Hardcover Bestseller list. At the same time, the paperback version of her book Before I Say Good-bye was the top-selling book on the New York Times Paperback Bestseller list.

Her books have been popular in France. In 2000, she was named a Chevalier of the Order of Arts and Letters in France. She also received the Grand Prix de Littérature Policière in 1980 and the Deauville Film Festival Literary Award in 1999. She was given the AIHS Gold Medal by the American Irish Historical Society for her achievements as an Irish-American.

Many of her books include stories about crimes involving children or the ability to read minds.

Although Higgins Clark knew that some people who claim to be psychics are not honest, she believed she had met people with real psychic abilities. For example, her son’s mother, Nora Higgins, once said that a photo of her son showed "death in his eyes," and the young man died soon after. A psychic told Higgins Clark, while her book Where Are the Children was being published, that she would become famous and earn a lot of money. At first, she did not believe this, but the next week, her book became a bestseller, and she sold the rights to make a movie based on it, which helped start her successful career.

Higgins Clark received many awards for her writing. These include the Horatio Alger Award (1997), the Passionists' Ethics in Literature Award (2002), the Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University Spirit of Achievement Award (1994), and the National Arts Club Gold Medal in Education (1994). She earned 18 honorary doctorates, including one from Fordham University, her college. Her heritage groups also honored her. The American Irish Historical Society gave her the Gold Medal of Honor in 1993, and she won the Ellis Island Medal of Honor in 2001. She was named a Bronx Legend in 1999.

Mary Higgins Clark was the chairman of the International Crime Congress in 1988 and the president of the Mystery Writers of America in 1987. She served on the board of directors of the Mystery Writers of America for many years. Simon & Schuster, the publisher of all her novels, signed her to a $64-million, four-book contract in the late 1990s. They also created the Mary Higgins Clark Award, given by the Mystery Writers of America to authors of suspense fiction. The award was announced at the 55th Annual Edgar Allan Poe Awards, where Higgins Clark was inducted as a Grand Master.

Higgins Clark was made a Dame of the Order of St. Gregory the Great and honored as a Dame of Malta and a Dame of the Order of the Holy Sepulchre. The Franciscan Friars gave her the Graymoor Award in 1999, and she received the Christopher Life Achievement Award. She served on the board of the Catholic Communal Fund and was a member of the board of governors at Hackensack Hospital.

In March 2011, Higgins Clark was inducted into the Irish America Hall of Fame.

Works

• 1968 Aspire to the Heavens (reprinted in 2002 as Mount Vernon Love Story: A Novel of George and Martha Washington)
• 1975 Where Are the Children?
• 1977 A Stranger is Watching
• 1980 The Cradle Will Fall
• 1982 A Cry in the Night
• 1984 Stillwatch
• 1986 Murder in Manhattan (co-authored with Thomas Chastain)
• 1987 Terror Stalks The Class Reunion (short story)
• 1987 Murder On The Aisle (short story)
• 1987 Weep No More, My Lady
• 1988 Caribbean Blues
• 1988 Double Vision (short story)
• 1989 While My Pretty One Sleeps
• 1989 That's The Ticket (short story, audio only)
• 1989 The Anastasia Syndrome and Other Stories
• 1989 The Lost Angel (short story, audio only)
• 1990 Voices in the Coal Bin (short story, audio only with Carol Higgins Clark's That's the Ticket)
• 1990 The Body in the Closet (short story, audio only)
• 1991 Loves Music, Loves to Dance
• 1992 All Around the Town
• 1992 Missing in Manhattan (anthology)
• 1993 I'll Be Seeing You
• 1993 Death on the Cape and Other Stories
• 1993 Stowaway and Milk Run (two stories)
• 1994 Remember Me (large print edition)
• 1995 Let Me Call You Sweetheart
• 1995 Justice in Manhattan (anthology)
• 1995 Silent Night
• 1995 Bad Behavior
• 1996 Moonlight Becomes You
• 1996 Mother: Famous Writers Celebrate Motherhood with a Treasury of Short Stories, Essays, and Poems
• 1996 My Gal Sunday
• 1997 Pretend You Don't See Her
• 1998 You Belong to Me
• 1999 We'll Meet Again
• 1999 The Night Awakens: A Mystery Writers of America Anthology
• 1999 The Plot Thickens (editor)
• 2000 Before I Say Good-Bye [fr]
• 2000 Deck The Halls
• 2001 On the Street Where You Live
• 2001 He Sees You When You're Sleeping
• 2002 Daddy's Little Girl
• 2002 Murder in the Family (anthology)
• 2003 The Second Time Around
• 2004 Nighttime Is My Time
• 2005 No Place Like Home
• 2006 Two Little Girls in Blue
• 2007 Ghost Ship
• 2007 I Heard That Song Before
• 2008 Where Are You Now?
• 2009 Just Take My Heart
• 2010 The Shadow of Your Smile
• 2011 The Magical Christmas Horse
• 2011 I'll Walk Alone
• 2012 The Lost Years
• 2013 Daddy's Gone A Hunting
• 2013 Plot Thickens (anthology)
• 2015 The Melody Lingers On
• 2016 Death Wears a Beauty Mask and Other Stories
• 2016 As Time Goes By
• 2017 All By Myself, Alone
• 2018 I've Got My Eyes on You
• 2019 Kiss the Girls and Make Them Cry
• 2023 "Where are the Children now?"

Alvirah and Willy series
Features Alvirah Meehan, a lottery winner, and her husband Willy, a plumber, as they solve crimes and murders.

• 1987 Weep No More, My Lady
• 1992 Plumbing For Willy (short story, included in The Lottery Winner)
• 1994 The Lottery Winner and Other Stories
• 1998 All Through the Night
• 2000 Deck the Halls (crossover with Carol's main protagonist Reagan Reilly)
• 2004 The Christmas Thief And Other Stories (crossover with Carol's main protagonist Reagan Reilly)
• 2006 Santa Cruise: A Holiday Mystery at Sea (crossover with Carol's main protagonist Reagan Reilly)
• 2008 Dashing Through the Snow (crossover with Carol's main protagonist Reagan Reilly)

Under Suspicion series
Features Laurie Moran, a producer on the television series Under Suspicion, a documentary program that investigates unsolved cold cases.

• 2014 I've Got You Under My Skin
• 2014 The Cinderella Murder (with Alafair Burke)
• 2015 All Dressed in White (with Alafair Burke)
• 2016 The Sleeping Beauty Killer (with Alafair Burke)
• 2017 Every Breath You Take (with Alafair

Adaptations

• 1982: A Stranger Is Watching
• 1986: Where Are the Children?

• 1983: The Cradle Will Fall
• 1987: Stillwatch
• 1992: Double Vision
• 1992: Terror Stalks the Class Reunion (French title)
• 1992: A Cry in the Night
• 1992: Weep No More My Lady
• 1995: Remember Me
• 1997: Let Me Call You Sweetheart
• 1997: While My Pretty One Sleeps
• 1998: Moonlight Becomes You
• 2001: Loves Music, Loves to Dance
• 2002: You Belong to Me
• 2002: Pretend You Don't See Her
• 2002: Haven't We Met Before?
• 2002: Lucky Day (French title)
• 2002: All Around the Town (French title)
• 2002: We'll Meet Again
• 2002: He Sees You When You're Sleeping
• 2003: A Crime of Passion
• 2003: Before I Say Goodbye
• 2004: I'll Be Seeing You
• 2004: Try to Remember
• 2004: The Cradle Will Fall
• 2004: Try to Remember
• 2011: Deck the Halls
• 2013: The Mystery Cruise
• 2013: Toi que j'aimais tant (Daddy's Little Girl)
• 2014: My Gal Sunday
• 2014: Où es-tu maintenant (Where Are You Now?)
• 2014: Deux petites filles en bleu (Two Little Girls in Blue)
• 2015: Souviens-toi (Remember Me)
• 2015: La clinique du docteur H (The Cradle Will Fall)
• 2015: Les années perdues (The Lost Years)
• 2018: Rien ne vaut la douceur du foyer (No Place Like Home)
• 2018: Ce que vivent les roses (Let Me Call You Sweetheart)