text: She published an article in The Objectivist repudiating Nathaniel Branden for dishonesty and "irrational behavior in his private life".In subsequent years, Rand and several more of her closest associates parted company.Rand had surgery for lung cancer in 1974 after decades of heavy smoking.In 1976, she retired from her newsletter and, after her initial objections, allowed a social worker employed by her attorney to enroll her in Social Security and Medicare.Her activities in the Objectivist movement declined, especially after her husband's death on November 9, 1979.One of her final projects was work on a never-completed television adaptation of Atlas Shrugged.On March 6, 1982, Rand died of heart failure at her home in New York City.Her funeral included a floral arrangement in the shape of a dollar sign.In her will, Rand named Peikoff as her heir.Literary approach, influences and reception Rand described her approach to literature as "romantic realism".She wanted her fiction to present the world "as it could be and should be", rather than as it was.This approach led her to create highly stylized situations and characters.Her fiction typically has protagonists who are heroic individualists, depicted as fit and attractive.Her villains support duty and collectivist moral ideals.Rand often describes them as unattractive, and some have names that suggest negative traits, such as Wesley Mouch in Atlas Shrugged.Rand considered plot a critical element of literature, and her stories typically have what biographer Anne Heller described as "tight, elaborate, fast-paced plotting".Romantic triangles are a common plot element in Rand's fiction; in most of her novels and plays, the main female character is romantically involved with at least two men.Influences In school Rand read works by Fyodor Dostoevsky, Victor Hugo, Edmond Rostand, and Friedrich Schiller, who became her favorites.