Pa$$ing the Buck: Commercial Romance

You couldn't expect Eileen Goudge, the best-selling author of Garden of Lies and over twenty "young adult" novels, to be at a loss for words. In a recent interview with The Crimson, she delved into issues such as her family, her step-family, her novels and her novels to come.

"I think I tell a good story," Goudge said when asked to explain the success of her first novel, Garden of Lies, a New York Times best seller for eight weeks. She says she feels the public finds her "belief in the human race" a refreshing change from the cynicism of other popular authors. Her new novel, Such Devoted Sisters, is a current hit at the bookstores.

Goudge's success has not come accompanied by generally favorable reviews. "Reviewers look at women's commercial fiction in a different light [compared to men's commercial fiction]," Goudge said, commenting on the mixed response of critics, charges: She is bitter that "military potboilers" written by men like Tom Clancy receive acclaim while her own "romantic potboilers" are merely accorded snide remarks.

Nevertheless, Goudge does not try to disguise that her artistic aspiration is to write popular fiction as opposed to great literature. She calims to have been inspired to write by a third cousin, Elizabeth Goudge, who wrote fiction with titles such as Towers in the Mist and Green Dolphin Lane which were widely read in Victorian England.

In addition, she mentions the fact that her novels are largely autobiographical. Goudge is the proud stepmother of Al Zuckerman's--her present husband and agent--several children from a previous marriage, including a son who is at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. Not coincidentally, the novel she is working on at present, Blessing in Disguise, is about being a stepmother and a writer in Manhattan.

Goudge also prides herself on her work in the teenage fictional genre. Her resume boasts books such as All Night Long and Too Good to be True--both in the "Sweet Valley High" series--as well as the four "Who Killed Peggy Sue?" books. And she has brought her creative touch to the "Seniors" series, which she developed for Dell Publishing.

Most of her material apparently comes from her own experience, since she claims to have "a total recall of [my] teenage years." She describes many of these books as "romans a clef," where many of the characters and places represent similar elements from her real life.

Goudge ended the interview by reiterating her credo: the success of her books with the general public is enough for her; she does not really care what the reviewers think. With typical wit, however, she did express the hope that The Crimson review of Such Devoted Sisters would not be "too Harvardish."