Jonathan Raban, the English author of popular travel books and novels, has died at 80, the Guardian reports. 

Raban, a native of the Norfolk town of Hempton, was educated at Hull University, where he studied English. He worked as a college lecturer and a book critic before publishing his first book, Soft City: The Art of Cosmopolitan Living, in 1974.

Several books followed, including the travel books Arabia Through the Looking Glass, Old Glory: An American Voyage, and Passage to Juneau. He also published three novels: Foreign Land, Waxwings, and Surveillance. His 1996 book, Bad Land: An American Romance, won the National Book Critics Circle Award for nonfiction.

His most recent book, a memoir titled Father and Son, is scheduled for publication on Sept. 19 by Knopf.

Raban’s admirers paid tribute to him on social media. On Twitter, essayist Abhrajyoti Chakraborty wrote, “Terrible, terrible news about Jonathan Raban. I’ll miss his voice. I read Passage To Juneau late, but some of his [London Review of Books] pieces were formative to me.”

And journalist Simon O’Hagan tweeted, “Very saddened by the news of the death of Jonathan Raban. I had the privilege of commissioning pieces from him and of visiting him at his home in Seattle. His writing made an impact like no one else’s I’ve ever encountered. He deserved to be so much better known. A huge loss. RIP.”

Michael Schaub, a journalist and regular contributor to NPR, lives near Austin, Texas.