Brother: Frank McCourt has meningitis

NEW YORK, July 16 (UPI) -- Pulitzer Prize-winning author Frank McCourt, who has been battling melanoma, is also suffering from meningitis and is in a New York hospice, his brother said.

"Frank was OK for a bit and we had hopes for a while after the treatment for melanoma, but the meningitis turned it all around, turned it topsy-turvy," Malachy McCourt told the Irish Echo newspaper Tuesday.

McCourt said relatives from around the world are arriving in New York to see Frank, a 78-year-old former teacher, actor and the author of the blockbuster book "Angela's Ashes."

McCourt told the newspaper his family wishes to keep private the location of the hospice where his brother is staying.