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The New York Times > AP > National > Author Hunter S. Thompson Kills Himself: "Author Hunter S. Thompson Kills Himself

The only author my father half-heartedly attempted to ban me from reading in high school.

ASPEN, Colo. (AP) -- Hunter S. Thompson, the acerbic counterculture writer who popularized a new form of fictional journalism in books like ``Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas,'' fatally shot himself Sunday night at his home, his son said. He was 67.

Besides the 1972 drug-hazed classic about Thompson's time in Las Vegas, he is credited with pioneering New Journalism -- or ``gonzo journalism'' -- in which the writer made himself an essential component of the story.

An acute observer of the decadence and depravity in American life, Thompson wrote such books as ``Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail'' in 1973 and the collections ``Generation of Swine'' and ``Songs of the Doomed.'' His first ever novel, ``The Rum Diary,'' written in 1959, was first published in 1998.

Other books include ``Hell's Angels'' and ``The Proud Highway.'' His most recent effort was ``Hey Rube: Blood Sport, the Bush Doctrine, and The Downward Spiral of Dumbness.''"