Bestselling Crime Author Patricia Cornwell Now Has No Helicopters
In order to make ends meet this year after suing her financial managers, writer Patricia Cornwell has sold off the following items:
- This personalized helicopter ("Patricia flies herself in the copter but has a pilot for her jet")
- This Bentley Continental GT Speed
- "Several homes"
From the New York Daily News:
In three-hours of often acerbic testimony in a federal courtroom in Boston Friday, Cornwell blamed New York-based money managers Anchin, Block and Anchin LLP for a series of renovation mishaps, bad real estate deals and risky investments that forced her to sell off her cars, helicopter and several homes in order to reduce her debt.
Normally I would not feel a great deal of pity for a woman who is forced to sell her helicopter. But in a publishing landscape where authors are often paid royalties based on net sales rather than list price of copies sold and frequently cut out of e-book rights, it is oddly satisfying to see someone make a tremendous amount of money from writing books for adults. The world needs more out lesbian true-crime authors who pilot helicopters and are obsessed with Jack the Ripper and maintained a warm friendship with Billy Graham's wife for many years.
Besides, she used to offer reporters a ride in it and now I'll never get one.
