Pat Abercromby

Pat was born in post-war Glasgow, leaving school at sixteen to work as a laboratory technician in veterinary research and later in Glasgow’s Public Health laboratory. At age 20, she left for London and worked in medical research in the Pharmaceutical Industry both in England and Germany.

She moved into the recruiting industry, establishing her own successful Medical Sales Recruitment Service. Two children later, amid the 1970s recession, she left the UK with her husband and children to live in Singapore. This started a 16-year odyssey of living in various overseas countries including Germany, Saudi Arabia, Australia and the USA while her husband flew as a flight engineer on the big jets. In Saudi Arabia, Pat hosted a chat show, Ahlan Wa Sahlan (Welcome) for three years, and wrote extensively for two Arab, English-speaking newspapers and for the In Flight magazine for Saudi Arabian Airlines.

When she returned to the UK at fifty, she retrained as a massage therapist, gained a Post Graduate Certificate of Education at 53 and established the Seated Acupressure Massage training school with her business partner, Davina Thomson.

Pat and Davina delivered their City and Guilds accredited training courses all around the UK and in Ireland for over ten years until Pat’s husband suffered a devastating stroke in 2007. She then had to give up her career to become her husband’s full-time carer. Eight year later, when he was diagnosed with unmanageable dementia, he went into a specialist dementia care nursing home and died four years later. Since then, Pat has reclaimed some of her lost freedoms and the opportunity to return to work part-time as a massage therapist, and pursue some personal interests, including creative writing. Her debut novel, Just One Life published 2017 was followed by The Knife Edge, (scary story based on true events) On Reflection, 2020, anthology of short stories, (mostly dystopian!) and poetry, with contributions from other writing friends, Song of Love, co-written with her friend Scarlett Palys, March 2024 ( total romantic fiction set in the fast-paced world of classical music.)

Pat lives in Buckinghamshire with her doggy pal Indie, and continues to write fiction.