Ryan Tubridy has said he was “flabbergasted” to learn of the death of Jeffrey Archer yesterday. 

The bestselling author and former Tory politician was 86 and his publisher, HarperCollins, said that he had passed away "suddenly and peacefully at home" in Wiltshire. 

He sold more than 300 million books in a writing career that spanned five decades. 

Before picking up his pen, Archer was also a Conservative MP for Louth in Lincolnshire between 1969 and 1974. 

He was then appointed to the House of Lords and became the Tory candidate for Mayor of London in 1999. However, he was convicted and jailed for perjury in 2001 after a court concluded he had lied in a libel case against the Daily Star.

It meant the end of his career in electoral politics, but did his writing career little harm. 

On The Claire Byrne Show, Ryan Tubridy said he had been due to host an event with Archer only the previous evening. 

However, a HarperCollins staff member came up to him, ashen-faced, to tell him there had been some terrible news - Archer had died and the event would not be going ahead. 

“They had to send an alert out to the people who were about to attend this function within the hour to say, ‘Please don't come’,” Mr Tubridy described. 

“I found myself packing up my bag and heading on the tube home

“I mean, there you are; the slings and arrows of life. 

“It was a spectacular end to a controversial, storied, difficult life.” 

The Archer family prepare to see Jeffrey Archer off back to his prison, following the end of the funeral of his mother. Picture by: Alamy.com.

While they were not friends, Mr Tubridy said he knew Archer well enough to say that he would “probably have approved of the drama” of his sudden death. 

The word ‘character’ fails to convey the magnitude of just how unusual a life Archer lived, which included global fame, incredible wealth and public humiliation. 

“He did spend four years behind bars and he got four books out of it or something like that,” Mr Tubridy said. 

“I mean, he never missed a trick and he wanted to be like this.

“He wanted to be the best cricket player for England, he wanted to be the greatest cross country runner for the Olympics, he wanted to be prime minister.

“[Instead, he became] the best selling author in the world - so, he kind of got one out of four in some ways.”

Main image: Split of Jeffrey Archer and Ryan Tubridy. Pictures by: Alamy.com.