It is with great sadness that I received the news of Esther Rantzen's death earlier this week. 

I first started working with Esther when I was a publisher at Penguin Books in the late 90s.  I met her at a charity event to raise funds for Childline and she asked me if I could help the charity by publishing a book to support it, which I did. 

So began a thirty year relationship with Esther, first as her publisher and then when I became a literary agent, as her literary agent and friend. 

Over the years I have been so hugely impressed with her dedication to helping others.  Unknown to many people she would often go into the Childline offices, and staff the phones to hear children calling in asking for help.  On one occasion she met me after such an event and burst into tears when she began to tell me what she had heard.  In a similar fashion, when she set up Silverline to help lonely elderly people often on their own, she would regularly ring several of them on Christmas Day so they had someone to talk to.  

She did this because she deeply cared.  She was brave and hugely courageous.  She was not frightened to speak truth to power and had little time for politicians who she felt said a lot but delivered very little. 

I shall never forget the pinch me moment of going to her parties at her home in North London and finding myself mingling with David Frost, Michael Parkinson and Terry Wogan among others.  

As a child who grew up in poverty, the son of working class immigrants, who loved watching Esther Rantzen on television,  I can't tell you how much it meant to me that she chose me, of all the agents out there, to represent her and stuck with me for so many years, through thick and thin. 

We became good friends, shared confidences, enjoyed each other's laughter and gossip, and had some crazy meals. 

She already knew how much I felt for her but towards the end, two weeks before she died, I spoke to her and told her again how much she had meant to me personally and how grateful I was for her love and friendship. 

I shall miss her enormously but I think so many of us will.  In the good works she did, she leaves a huge legacy behind her which will go on.  

Luigi Bonomi 

Publisher, literary agent, and friend.