Patricia Robins

Patricia Robins (1 February 1921 – 4 December 2016) was a British writer of short stories and over 80 novels, mainly romance, from 1934 to 2016. She also signed under the pseudonym Claire Lorrimer; she had sold more than ten million copies. She served as Women's Auxiliary Air Force officer during World War II tracking Nazi bombers.

Robins came from an artistic family. Her mother was the popular romance writer Denise Robins, who sold more than one hundred million copies and was the first president of the Romantic Novelists' Association (1960–1966). Her maternal grandmother was the writer K. C. Groom and her maternal grandfather was Herman Klein, a musician. Her maternal uncle was Adrian Cornwell-Clyne, who wrote books on photography and cinematography, another uncle was an artist, as is her daughter.

Patricia Denise Robins was born on 1 February 1921 in Hove, Sussex, England, the second daughter of Arthur Robins, a corn broker on the Baltic Exchange and Denise Robins, a prolific author, who sold more than one hundred million copies, and the first president of the Romantic Novelists' Association (1960–1966). She had two sisters, Eve Louise and Anne Eleanor. She was educated at Parents' National Educational Union at Burgess Hill, Sussex, and also in Switzerland and Germany.

Her mother encouraged her to write, and at 12 she published her first children's novella in 1934. She worked as junior editor in a woman's magazine editorial and published short stories.

Thanks to her knowledge of German, she served as Women's Auxiliary Air Force officer during World War II. She tracked Nazi bombers with the fledgling British radar system in a top-secret RAF filter room. Not until 2013 did she receive recognition, due to the confidential nature of her work.

During the war she also went on to write contemporary romance novels like her mother. She also published some children's stories.

In 1947, she married former RAF pilot Donald Clark, they had three children, Ian, Nicky and Graeme. Because of her husband's job, the family lived in many countries, including Libya. After their divorce, she started a relationship with Mel Hack and moved to a 400-year-old former barn in rural Kent.

In the 1967 she started to use the pseudonym Claire Lorrimer to write Gothic romances, and later family sagas. Some of her early novels were reedited under different titles and as Clare Lorrimer.

In her late years, she devoted more time to her eight grandchildren, Emily, Jemma, Polly, Charlotte, Thomas, Arthur, Max and Tilly, but she continued writing until her death.

In 2007, she published her autobiography You Never Know as Claire Lorrimer.

Yes, after every book is finished I decide it is the last one, and then I get an idea in my head and it germinates and before I know it I've started typing and we are off again.

In March 2016, she was given the Outstanding Achievement Award at the Romantic Novelists' Association. She died on 4 December 2016 in Hove.