Nina Bawden, the author of 48 books including the children’s story Carrie’s War, has died at the age of 87, her publisher said.

Her son, Robert Bawden, and her publisher, Virago, added that the writer died at her home in north London, surrounded by members of her family.

One of Ms Bawden’s last books, Dear Austen, followed the Potter’s Bar train accident in 2002, which killed her husband Austen Kark.

Ms Bawden herself was also badly injured in the crash.

A statement said: “Nina Bawden died quietly this morning, August 22, 2012, at home in North London with her family. She was 87 years old.”

Her most famous children’s story, Carrie’s War, published in 1973, was based on her childhood evacuation to Wales during World War II.

The book was a Phoenix Award winner in 1993.

Circles of Deceit, one of Ms Bawden’s novels for adult readers, was shortlisted for the 1987 Booker Prize.

The writer’s publisher at Virago, Lennie Goodings, paid tribute, saying Ms Bawden was still writing days before she died.

“She was a gently fierce, clever, elegant, wickedly funny woman,” she said.

“She wrote slim books but they were powerful and extraordinarily acute observ-ations about what makes us human.

“I think she was especially good on what goes on behind the façade of good behaviour.

“She was a wonderful storyteller and she was writing to the end. With the help of her son, Robert Bawden, she finished a piece on growing up in the 1940s for a forthcoming Virago anthology just days before she passed away.”

Ms Bawden’s other books, seen as modern classics, include The Peppermint Pig, The Runaway Summer and Keeping Henry.

Several of her books, including Family Money and Carrie’s War, have famously been adapted for film or television.

Her works have also been translated into several languages.

A 2004 adaptation of Carrie’s War for the BBC starred Keeley Fawcett as Carrie as well as Lesley Sharp, Alun Armstrong and Pauline Quirke.

Prunella Scales and Kacey Ainsworth starred in a stage adapt-ation in the West End.

In 2002 Ms Bawden and her husband, the managing director of the BBC World Service, were on their way to a birthday party in Cambridge when their train was derailed at Potter’s Bar.

Playwright Sir David Hare, who portrayed Ms Bawden in his play The Permanent Way, paid tribute to the writer, saying: “I am extremely sad to hear of Nina’s passing away.

“She was an uncomplicatedly good woman, whose long fight to obtain justice for the victims of the Potter’s Bar crash was altogether a model of eloquence, principle and human decency.”

Francesca Dow, managing director of Penguin children’s division, said: “We are hugely saddened by the death of Nina Bawden – as proud publishers of Nina’s work for Puffin, and for each of us here on a personal level.

“Nina was a wonderful storyteller, brilliant at stepping into the minds of her characters and conjuring up a powerful sense of time and place.

“Such is the appeal and power of her classic novels that they continue to sell strongly today.

“Nina has made a significant contribution to children’s liter-ature and been an influence on many younger writers. She will be sorely missed.”

Ms Bawden received the prestigious ST Dupont Golden Pen Award for a lifetime’s contribution to literature in 2004.