Actor turned novelist dies from MND, 59

A BEST-SELLING crime writer who originally found fame as an actor has died aged 59, seven months after being diagnosed with motor neurone disease.

In the 1980s Clare Dunkel starred in iconic British comediesareyou Being Served?, below, and Thetwo Ronnies.

She then carved out a successful second career writing grisly inventive crime fiction under the pen name Mo Hayder.

Born Clare Damaris Bastin in Epping, Essex, in 1962, to a teacher mother and an astronomer father, she dropped out of school, dyed her hair green and ran away to London just before her 16th birthday, to live with her musician boyfriend.

Four years later she won the Miss

Nude beauty pageant in 1982 and began using the stage name Candy Davis, dying her hair peroxide blonde and posing for Page 3 shots in the tabloids. But it was when she appeared as the blonde bombshell Miss Selfridge in the last two series of the hugely successful BBC sitcom Are You Being Served? that she shot to stardom.

She was in 13 episodes of the BBC sitcom from 1983 until 1985 and went on to appear inthe Benny Hill Show and Thetwo Ronnies.

Clare married actor Gary Olsen in 1985 but they later divorced. After ditching her Candy Davis persona, she moved to Japan aged 25 and worked as a hostess in atokyo nightclub.

She said her fascination with crime was sparked during this time by seeing three people die. She returned to Britain, changing her surname by deed poll to Dunkel and in 1995 began writing her first novel, Birdman. Published in 1999 under the pen name Mo Hayder it became an international bestseller.

She went on to publish 10 novels, selling more than 6.5 million copies worldwide. Her 10th bookwolf is currently being adapted for the BBC.

Clare was diagnosed with MND last December. She is survived by her daughter Lotte and second husband Bob.