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PEOPLE dives into the colorful life of author Danielle Steel, who has written 212 books, been married five times, and has nine children

Steel's passion, other than writing, is being a mother. She says her own childhood was lonely and her parents weren't there much. She's still grieving the loss of her son Nicky, who died by suicide at 19 in 1997

Steel's life was upended in 1994 when an unauthorized biography put her in the public eye and she became tabloid fodder. The experience broke up a marriage and nearly made her quit writing

PEOPLE first interviewed author Danielle Steel in 1979, when her fourth novel, The Promise , was selling at a rate of 6,000 copies a week, and had already gone through a two-million print run. Over the course of her now 50-year career, she’s

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