Tom Wolfe, author of 'The Right Stuff' dies at 88

Author Tom Wolfe, the acerbic chronicler of American society known for "The Right Stuff" and "The Bonfire of the Vanities," has died at the age of 88.

Wolfe's agent Lynn Nesbit told US media the writer died Monday in a Manhattan hospital, where he was being treated for an infection.

"We are incredibly saddened to hear about the passing of Tom Wolfe," his publisher Picador said. "He was one of the greats and his words will live on forever." During a prolific career, Wolfe turned his scathing pen to pop culture, the hippie movement, the art world, LSD, race relations and the lives of astronauts.

A dapper dresser and New York icon, Wolfe was known for his trademark white suits, homburg hats and white kid gloves.

Wolfe started his career as a newspaper reporter with the New York Herald-Tribune in 1962.

His first book, a collection of articles about the flamboyant Sixties, was published in 1965 as "The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby." The book became a bestseller, and established Wolfe as a leading figure in the "New Journalism" movement, which also included in its ranks Hunter S. Thompson, Norman Mailer and Truman Capote. Wolfe's 1979 bestseller "The Right Stuff" focused on the US astronauts involved in the space race with the Soviet Union.

It was made into a Hollywood hit starring Sam Shepard and made the Air Force test pilot Chuck Yeager, the first man to break the sound barrier, a household name. Wolfe moved to writing novels in the mid-1980s, penning "The Bonfire of the Vanities."