Cuban-American writer Oscar Hijuelos, who won the Pulitzer Prize for his best-selling novel "The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love," has died at the age of 62, the New York Times reported on Sunday.
Hijuelos, who in 1990 became the first Cuban-born novelist to receive the Pulitzer Prize for fiction, died in Manhattan after collapsing on a tennis court, the Times reported, citing his wife, Lisa Marie Carlson.
Born in New York City to Cuban immigrant parents, Hijuelos published his first novel, "Our House in the Last World," in 1983.
"The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love," his second novel, told the story of a pair of Cuban-born brothers, both musicians, who emigrate to New York City in the 1950s and achieve short-lived fame after appearing on the "I Love Lucy" show.
The book was later adapted for a 1992 Hollywood film starring Antonio Banderas and Armand Assante.
Hijuelos went on to publish more novels, including "The Fourteen Sisters of Emilio Montez O'Brien" and "Mr. Ives' Christmas."
In 2011 he published a memoir, "Thoughts Without Cigarettes."
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