Nina Davis King, former Newsday editor, dies at 68

Nina Davis King, who turned an early passion for the written word into a career as a book review editor at Newsday and The Washington Post, died Thursday at age 68.

King, who lived in Alexandria, Va., died from complications related to Parkinson's disease.

An author who held a doctorate in English literature, King had both her personal and professional lives shaped by books, her family said. In a chapter she contributed to "A Passion for Books," published in 1999, King recalled sitting on her grandmother's floor as a young girl, poring over early 20th-century children's literature such as "The Bobbsey Twins" and "Nancy Drew."

"I would read anything in preference to nothing, and I would read in preference to doing almost anything else," she wrote.

The second of two daughters of a U.S. Navy admiral, Nina Davis was born May 7, 1941, in the Panama Canal Zone and graduated from high school in Paris in 1959. She attended college in various countries before receiving her bachelor's degree Phi Beta Kappa at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1963.

While at North Carolina, she met her first husband, Wayne King, whose name she kept for the rest of her life. When he went to work as a reporter at the Detroit Free Press in 1964, King entered graduate school at Wayne State University. Two years later they moved to New York City for Wayne King to work at The New York Times. The couple divorced in 1968.

After getting her doctorate, King joined Newsday in 1973 and worked on the night copy desk before becoming the paper's book editor in 1977, overseeing the section while continuing to write reviews. She also met her second husband, John Cashman, a Newsday reporter and editor. The couple lived in Sea Cliff and married shortly before his death in 1985.

"Nina was an elegant and well-read woman but down to earth in every way," said Fred Bruning, 69, a friend and former Newsday reporter. "She loved newspapers and newspaper people."

In 1988, King moved to Washington, D.C., to be the top editor of The Washington Post's book review section, Book World. She continued to lead the section for many years as the effects of Parkinson's disease worsened. She retired in 1999 and lived in the Washington area for the rest of her life.

King is survived by her sister Jean of Ridegcrest, Calif. A memorial service is to be held in Alexandria on May 14. In lieu of flowers, her family requests donations be sent to The National Parkinson Foundation in Miami.