Author Nicholas Evans has kidney transplant after poisoning

Jul 17 2011 by Coreena Ford, Sunday Sun

A FORMER North journalist who almost died after eating deadly mushrooms is on the mend after his daughter donated a kidney.

Author Nicholas Evans started his career as a cub reporter on our sister paper the Evening Chronicle, spending many years in Newcastle in the 1970s before becoming a millionaire with his first book The Horse Whisperer.

But in a plot to mirror one of his books, Nicholas and three members of his family were almost killed after eating a dish made with highly toxic mushrooms he’d picked, believing them to be edible fungi.

He, his wife Charlotte and Charlotte’s brother and sister-in-law, Sir Alastair and Lady Louisa Gordon-Cumming, suffered a near-fatal reaction after eating the deadly webcap mushroom – mistaken as harmless ceps – and Nicholas has needed five hours of daily dialysis to counter kidney failure ever since.

Now, after nearly three years on the transplant list, the 60-year-old writer – whose debut novel was turned into a blockbuster movie starring Robert Redford – is recovering well after his daughter Lauren gave him one of her kidneys.

He said: “After eating poisonous mushrooms three years ago, I lost the use of my kidneys.

“For all of that time my wonderful daughter has been offering me one of hers. We turned out to be a perfect match.

“The transplant happened last week. We are both a bit sore but doing fine.”

It was August 2008 that Nicholas went mushroom picking on his brother-in-law’s vast estate in Scotland.