Date of birth: 1910
Date of death: 2004
Website:

Melanie Pflaum, wife of Irving Peter Pflaum, foreign editor of the Sun Times, author of Tragic Island, lived in Chicago, Spain, London, Cuba and New Zealand. Melanie and Irving lived in Spain during the Spanish Civil War and Bolero is inspired by her experiences during that conflict. Gentle Tyrants recounts the story of her grandfather, an immigrant from France who made a fortune in Chicago from scrap metal but refused to buy furniture, so sure he was going back to France any day. Other books are set in Panama, based on the murder of a president of Panama in the 1950s, an incident covered by her husband, in Cuba at the time of the revolution, as she also lived in Cuba in 1960-61.

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