Blessing in Disguise (66 page)

“I think I needed to prove to myself,” she went on, “that the man I’d so cherished was above reproach in
every
way. I’d clung to that belief, in the face of my doubts ... even going so far as to condemn those who tried to tell me otherwise. I was afraid, you see. Of discovering that everything I’d believed in was a lie. Then, one day, I realized I was creating, not a memorial, but a ... prison.”

It was almost as if it wasn’t her speaking, but someone reading aloud a familiar passage from some ancient book, the unrehearsed words flowing from her as if they’d been spoken many times before. She saw before her an ocean of faces stunned into absolute immobility. It was almost eerily quiet—the only sounds the persistent whirr of minicams and the muttering of the wind. She took a deep breath, and continued, “I know now that it is only when we open our minds that we can we truly memorialize our great men, our ideals. Because we will have learned that the human heart is an instrument, most of all, of forgiveness. And that true understanding can only come from allowing those we most esteem and hold dear to be human. I hope
that
is what you’ll think of when you look upon this memorial built in my husband’s name ...” She smiled, waiting for the tightness in her throat to subside. “... and designed by his daughter Nola Emory Truscott, whose contribution I would like to acknowledge on this important day.”

The crowd’s collective gasp was like an ocean wave swelling toward her. She caught a glimpse of Nola’s face, shocked, and then seeming to shimmer, a proud joy rising from her like waves of heat from parched ground.

Cordelia stepped back from the microphone, feeling a kind of horror mixed with relief. Had she really said all that? At the same time, she
felt,
as well as heard, the applause that began low to the ground and then seemed to swell, lifting her up like the beating wings of a hundred thousand eagles. She saw, as if from some spiraling height, the pale valentine that was Grace’s face, shining with tears ... and, beside her, Sissy, in a polka-dot shirtwaist, looking vaguely bewildered, as if not quite sure whether she ought to be pleased or scandalized.

But Nola,
she
had grasped it all ... and if two people who had started out with nothing in common but bitterness and resentment could ever be reconciled, then they had just come within a hair’s breadth of it.

But she wasn’t finished yet. The hard part was still ahead of her. Yet, strangely, it took no effort on her part at all to move in that direction.

She descended from the platform as if propelled by nothing more than the force of her longing ... past the curtain of people and reporters and cameras on either side of her ... past Lucinda Parmenter in a flowered hat staring slack-mouthed at her ... past Sissy, now struggling to subdue that little monster of hers, Beau, who’d just kicked the bejesus out of his brother ... past all the reasons that she had ever believed mattered, and which she now knew were as inconsequential as yesterday’s weather.

When she reached Gabe, she wavered for a moment, unable, or unwilling—she didn’t know which—to take that very last step. Then he smiled and reached out, and while cameras clicked and whirred and flashed, and a low buzz of voices cut through the waning applause, Cordelia accepted the callused hand of the man she intended to marry, come hell or high water.

I’ve led a storied life in more ways than one. I’ve gone places and done things that astound me, looking back on it. Where did I ever find the courage? The willpower? Much of it I would advise against, were I to go back in time and have a heart-to-heart with my younger self. But good or bad, it was all grist for the mill, so I regret none of it. (Though I feel fortunate not to be haunted by compromising photos of myself online, having come of age in the pre-Internet era). The beauty of fiction is you can reshape past events however you please. I wasn’t popular in high school but got to hang out with the cool kids when I wrote for the phenomenally successful teen series Sweet Valley High in the early years of my career. Trust me, you wouldn’t have wanted to live through some of what I lived through, but hopefully you’ve enjoyed the novels that came of it.

If you Google my name, you will see my Cinderella story: welfare mom to millionaire. Every word is true, though the reality is I was a starving artist for a much longer period of time than I was on welfare. With two young children to support on my own, I often had to forgo purchasing the office supplies and stamps needed for submitting the articles and short stories I wrote on spec. Instead I used that money to put food on the table.

The lean years were the making of me, though. When I wrote my first adult novel,
Garden of Lies
, the story of babies switched at birth, one of whom grows up rich, the other poor, I knew what it was to go hungry. I knew what it was like for Rose putting on the skirt she wears to work every day, ironed so many times it’s shiny in spots.
Garden of Lies
went on to become a
New York Times
bestseller, translated into twenty-two languages. I attribute its success in part to my having suffered.

I’ve also had my share of romantic ups and downs. More grist for the mill and the reason my fictional characters tend to be of the folks-this-ain’t-my-first-rodeo variety. I’ve been married more than once. At one point, I was married to my agent. His client list boasts some notable names, and just recently I was struck by the realization that I had dined with two of the famous people depicted in the movies
The Theory of Everything
and
Selma
: professor Stephen Hawking and Coretta Scott King, respectively. How extraordinary! I witnessed history and saw it reenacted on film.

I met my current and forever husband,
Sandy Kenyon
, in a Hollywood meet-cute, which seems fitting given he’s in the entertainment business, as a TV reporter and film critic. He had a radio talk show in Arizona at the time. I was a guest on his show, phoning in from New York City, where I live. He called me at home that night, at my invitation, and we talked for three hours. It became our nightly ritual, and when we finally met it was love at first sight, though we were hardly strangers. We married in 1996, and he became the inspiration for talk-show host Eric Sandstrom in
Thorns of Truth
. Though, as Sandy’s fond of saying, he never killed a coanchor while driving drunk.

I have many people to thank for the support and guidance I’ve received along the way.

First and foremost, my husband, Sandy, who’s been there every step of the way and who reads multiple drafts of my novels. He’s patient, kind, and wise. He understands when I’m there in body but somewhere else in my mind, and doesn’t get too upset at having to repeat himself more than once to get through to me. From him I learned the true meaning of romantic love, which has enriched my fictional love stories immeasurably. He’s also partly the reason I’m still walking this earth. More than once it was his hand on my arm, pulling me to safety, that kept me from stepping into the path of a moving vehicle while in one of my preoccupied states.

To my children, Michael and Mary, for being the quirky, loving individuals they are. Whenever I beat myself up for having been a less-than-perfect parent (which pretty much describes every single parent), they tell me they couldn’t love me any more than they do. They also both have a wicked sense of humor, which they get from me. When I was exploring the idea of having another child, with Sandy, I was told I’d need an egg donor. Which led to the what-if scenario that would have me giving birth to my own grandchild (and writing the bestseller that would come of it!), at which point my daughter remarked dryly, “Mom, would you like that over easy or sunny side up?”

To friends and family who have made their vacation homes available to me through the years. Their generosity has allowed me to go away for extended periods of time to write in solitude amid serene settings. Bill and Valerie Anders. Frank Cassata and Thomas Rosamilia. Miles and Karen Potter. Jon Giswold. Thanks to my friend Jon, I was introduced to the scenic wonders of northern Wisconsin and befriended by the good people of Grantsburg, which I now consider my home away from home.

To my friends and author pals, who are my cheering section. Whenever I’m at a low point or feeling blue, they’re always there to offer a hug, a pat on the back, or a word of encouragement. I wouldn’t be where I am today if not for them.

I smile, and brush away a tear, whenever I think of my oldest friend, Kay Terzian, who had every single one of my titles, in multiple editions, when she passed away. She would always say she was my biggest fan. I never doubted it.

I am also blessed to have many loyal readers. They range in age from fourteen to ninety-four and come from all walks of life and all parts of the globe. One, a prisoner doing time on a drug offense, sent letters commenting intelligently on my novels, which I was happy to know were available in prison libraries. Shortly before his release, he sent me a Mother’s Day card. I had written a few times in response to his letters, but would hardly describe myself as a pen pal, let alone a surrogate mom. I think he regarded me fondly because he felt he knew what was in my heart, which I pour into the pages of my novels. That is the greatest compliment of all and the best part of what I do for a living, worth more to me than fame or fortune.

Thank you for taking this journey with me. If you’ve enjoyed what you’ve read, leave a comment on Amazon or Goodreads to help spread the word, so I can keep doing what I do.

Eileen Goudge

Eileen Goudge (b. 1950) is one of the nation’s most successful authors of women’s fiction, beginning with the acclaimed six-million-copy bestseller
Garden of Lies
.

Goudge is one of six children, and the joys and strife that come with a large family have informed her fiction, much of which centers on issues of sisterhood and family. At eighteen she quit college to get married, a whirlwind experience that two years later left her divorced, broke, and responsible for her first child. It was then that she started writing in earnest.

On a typewriter borrowed from a neighbor, Goudge began turning out short stories and articles. For years she had limited success—selling work to
McCall’s
,
Reader’s Digest
, and the
San Francisco Chronicle
—but in the early eighties she took a job writing for a new young adult series that would become the phenomenally successful
Sweet Valley High
.

Goudge moved her family from California to New York City, where she spent several years writing young-adult fiction, creating series such as
Seniors
,
Swept Away
, and
Who Killed Peggy Sue?
In 1986 she published her first novel of adult fiction,
Garden of Lies
, inspired by a childhood anxiety that, because she did not resemble her brothers and sisters, she had been secretly adopted—a suspicion so strong that, at twelve, Goudge broke into her father’s lockbox expecting to find adoption papers. (She did not.) The tale of children swapped at birth was a national sensation, spent sixteen weeks on the
New York Times
bestseller list, and eventually yielded a sequel,
Thorns of Truth
(1998), which Goudge wrote in response to a decade of fan mail demanding she resolve the story.

Since then, Goudge has continued writing women’s fiction, producing a total of thirteen novels to date. Her most popular works include the three-book saga of Carson Springs—
Stranger in Paradise
(2001),
Taste of Honey
(2002), and
Wish Come True
(2003)—a small, secret-ridden town that Goudge based on scenic Ojai, California. She has also published a cookbook,
Something Warm from the Oven
, which contains recipes that Goudge developed as a reprieve from the stresses of writing novels.

Goudge met her current husband while conducting an interview over the telephone. Entertainment reporter Sandy Kenyon was so taken with the author that he asked if he could call her back when the interview was done, and after weeks of late-night conversations they met in person and were married in 1996.

Goudge lives with Kenyon in New York City.