(NEW YORK) — Revered journalist and author Joan Didion died Thursday at her home in New York City due to complications from Parkinson’s disease, her longtime publisher confirmed to ABC News. She was 87-years-old.

Didion was known as one of most incisive writers of her time, penning screenplays, novels and works of nonfiction, including two books about her own personal losses: “The Year of Magical Thinking” and “Blue Nights.”

“Joan was a brilliant observer and listener, a wise and subtle teller of truths about our present and future. She was fierce and fearless in her reporting. Her writing is timeless and powerful, and her prose has influenced millions,” her editor, Shelley Wanger, said in a statement. “She was a close and longtime friend, loved by many, including those of us who worked with her at Knopf. We will mourn her death but celebrate her life, knowing that her work will inspire generations of readers and writers to come.”

Born in Sacramento, Didion was a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley, and went on to live in New York City, where she launched her career as a journalist, working at Vogue. Her first book, “Run River,” was published in 1963; other novels included “A Book of Common Prayer,” “Democracy” and “The Last Thing He Wanted.”

The next year, Didion married fellow writer John Gregory Dunne, who became her longtime collaborator. Together, they moved to California and worked on screenplays for “The Panic in Needle Park,” “Play It As It Lays,” based on her novel of the same name about Hollywood and depression, and “A Star Is Born,” among others.

In 1967, Didion and Dunne adopted their daughter, Quintana Roo.

Didion documented her time in California in the ’60s, including an unflinching look at the counterculture movement, in an essay collection, “Slouching Towards Bethlehem,” that became iconic.

“My only advantage as a reporter is that I am so physically small, so temperamentally unobtrusive, and so neurotically inarticulate that people tend to forget that my presence runs counter to their best interests. And it always does,” she wrote as part of that collection.

Alongside “The White Album,” a later collection of essays, Didion established herself as a storyteller for California in the second half of the 20th century.

Through the last two decades of the 20th century, Didion wrote about the Central Park Five, El Salvador and the Cold War, and plenty on American politics, among many other topics — sometimes as reporting and nonfiction essays, sometimes as novels.

“The narrative is made up of many such understandings, tacit agreements, small and large, to overlook the observable in the interests of obtaining a dramatic story line,” she wrote in a 1988 piece for The New York Review about presidential election campaigns.

Even as she had said “Goodbye to All That,” Didion kept a foot in New York for the rest of her life. Into the 2000s, Didion and Dunne lived in a New York City apartment, where Dunne died in late December 2003 of a sudden heart attack.

She wrote a memoir, “The Year of Magical Thinking,” as a sort of attempt to understand her husband’s death. With her characteristic specificity and thoughtfulness, she reported on her own thoughts in the year after Dunne’s death, a portrait that earned her the National Book Award for Fiction in 2005.

As her husband died, their daughter, Quintana, was in the hospital with pneumonia and septic shock. While Quintana ultimately survived that, she died a year and a half later, in August 2005, shortly before “The Year of Magical Thinking” was published, after a fall. After her daughter’s death, Didion wrote “Blue Nights,” published in 2011, a kaleidoscopic rumination on motherhood, illness and death, and Quintana.

Didion, a 2013 recipient of the National Medal of Arts and Humanities, had her latest essay collection, “Let Me Tell You What I Mean,” published earlier this year.

“All I knew then was what I couldn’t do,” Didion wrote about her college years, in a 1976 piece for the New York Times titled “Why I Write.” “All I knew then was what I wasn’t, and it took me some years to discover what I was.

Which was a writer.”

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(LOS ANGELES) — Two people were fatally shot, including a 14-year-old girl struck by a stray bullet that entered her dressing room, after officers opened fire during a confrontation with a suspect at a Los Angeles clothing store, police said.

The incident occurred shortly before noon Thursday at a Burlington store in North Hollywood, where Los Angeles police responded to reports of an assault with a deadly weapon, the Los Angeles Police Department said.

While searching for the suspect, “the officers encountered an individual who was in the process of assaulting another, and an officer-involved shooting occurred,” LAPD Capt. Stacy Spell told reporters during a news briefing.

The suspect, an adult man, was shot by police and declared dead at the scene, LAPD said.

A second person was also shot during the incident, whom LAPD later identified as a 14-year-old girl.

Police believe the teenager was struck by an officer’s bullet fired at the assault suspect that penetrated a wall into her dressing room, LAPD said in an update Thursday evening. She was found during a search for additional suspects and victims and pronounced dead at the scene, police said.

“At this time we believe it was a round coming from an officer,” LAPD Assistant Chief Dominic Choi told reporters Thursday evening.

The identities of the teenager and suspect have not been released.

A third person, a woman, was also injured during the alleged assault, Spell said, and was transported to the hospital. Investigators were still determining the extent and nature of her injuries.

It is also unclear if there was any connection between her and the suspect, Choi said.

Investigators were still determining what prompted the officers to open fire and what the alleged weapon was. Police have not found a gun during the search of the area at this time, Choi said.

“We’re at the very preliminary stages of this investigation,” Spell said. “There’s still a lot of surveillance video to review, there are witnesses to interview.”

Investigators will also be looking at police body-worn camera footage, which was on during the incident, Choi said. The officers involved in the shooting also still need to be interviewed, he said.

A Burlington spokesperson said the company is supporting authorities during the ongoing investigation.

“At Burlington, our hearts are heavy as a result of the tragic incident that occurred today at our North Hollywood, CA store,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “Our top priority is always the safety and well-being of our customers and associates.”

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(NEW YORK) — A security assessment issued Thursday said there is no “credible” threat at this time ahead of next week’s New Year’s Eve celebration in New York City’s Times Square, which will bring back a limited crowd after last year’s virtual event.

Law enforcement agencies “have no information to indicate a credible, specific threat to, or associated with, the 2021-2022 Times Square New Year’s Eve Celebration,” according to the assessment, which was obtained by ABC News.

The threat assessment does indicate a general concern about “the sustained interest of homegrown violent extremists and domestic violent extremists in targeting mass gatherings despite the lack of information indicating a credible, specific threat.”

The city will allow 15,000 people at this year’s scaled-back ball drop, which was closed to crowds last year due to the pandemic. With spectators returning, law enforcement officials are concerned about lone offenders or small groups potentially targeting the event.

“[Homegrown violent extremists] are of particular concern due to their ability to remain undetected until operational, their willingness to attack civilians and soft targets, and their ability to inflict significant casualties with simple tactics,” the assessment stated.

Domestic terrorists could also be inspired to target the celebration, the assessment stated, citing “likely non-credible online posts mentioning the event as a potential opportunity to launch attacks.”

The FBI, Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Intelligence and Analysis, New York City Police Department, AMTRAK Police Department and Port Authority Police Department issued the threat assessment.

The city typically allows 58,000 people in viewing areas at the Times Square celebration. The smaller attendance at this year’s event will allow for social distancing, according to the mayor’s office, which announced the capacity limits Thursday as COVID-19 cases spike in the city.

Those who attend will be required to show proof of vaccination and wear masks, the office also announced. Guest entry will also begin at 3 p.m., which is “much later” than past years, it said.

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(NEW YORK) — Weather alerts are in effect from California to the Texas Panhandle, and rounds of heavy mountain snow, rain and strong winds are expected to impact much of the western U.S. in the coming days.

As of Thursday afternoon, mountain snow is falling at higher elevations in the Cascades down into the northern Sierra Nevada. Also, heavy rain is moving through parts of California, particularly through Southern California.

Officials are warning that torrential rain could trigger flash flooding, mudslides and debris flows, especially across regions burned by wildfires. A flood watch has been issued from Orange County, California, to San Diego.

Several feet of heavy mountain snow is expected to fall across much of the Sierra Nevada in California though Sunday. Some of the highest peaks in the Sierra Nevada could see up to 10 feet of snow by the end of the weekend.

Strong winds could increase avalanche risk in parts of the region, officials warn. An avalanche warning is in effect through at least Friday morning for parts of the region, including the greater Lake Tahoe area.

Also, the Rockies will eventually see at least a foot of snow heading into the weekend. Winter weather alerts are in effect across much of the mountain west with wind alerts in some areas as well.

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(BOSTON) — A former Boston College student charged with involuntary manslaughter in connection with her boyfriend’s suicide pleaded guilty Thursday as part of a plea deal.

Inyoung You, 23, changed her plea two years after initially pleading not guilty in Suffolk Superior Court in Boston in the death of her then-boyfriend, Alexander Urtula.

Urtula died by suicide at the age of 22 on May 20, 2019, the day of his graduation from Boston College. Prosecutors argued that You “directly contributed” to Urtula’s suicide through “escalating and unrelenting verbal, physical and psychological abuse that she admitted in court,” the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office said in a statement following Thursday’s hearing.

Prosecutors said You sent Urtula more than 47,000 text messages over the course of their 18-month-long relationship, in which she “repeatedly told the victim that he should kill himself or die and waged a campaign of abuse that stripped the victim of his free will,” the statement said.

“The abuse became more frequent, more overwhelming, and debilitating in the days and hours leading up to Mr. Urtula’s tragic death,” the district attorney’s office said.

As part of the plea deal, Judge Robert Ullmann sentenced You to 10 years probation, during which she is barred from profiting financially from the case. If she adheres to the terms of her probation, which also includes community service and mental health treatment, she can avoid a two-and-a-half-year jail sentence.

The sentence was recommended by prosecutors and You’s legal team and “made in close consultation with the Urtula family,” District Attorney Rachael Rollins said in a statement.

“It is consistent with their desire to seek accountability and closure and to protect the legacy of Alexander, a loving son, brother, and uncle,” Rollins continued. “They believe this is something Alexander would have wanted.”

The Urtula family read a victim impact statement during the hearing and shared a photo of him with his nephews.

“We bear no feelings of anger or reprisal. We believe that time will take us through in the moments we mourn and celebrate his life,” the family said, according to the Associated Press.

You declined the opportunity to speak in court and her lawyer, Steven Kim, said she was “very distraught,” the AP reported. You is a “wonderful young woman who has deep, deep remorse,” Kim said, according to the AP.

The case has drawn comparisons to that of Michelle Carter, who was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in 2017 three years after her then-boyfriend, Conrad Roy III, died by suicide. Carter, who had sent Roy texts urging him to kill himself, was sentenced to 15 months in jail. She was released about three months early in 2020.

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