Eileen Goudge, ALL THEY NEED TO KNOW
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[0:43]Eileen Gauge is the author of All They Need to Know, A Novel.
[0:47]Eileen is the New York Times bestselling author of more than 20 novels, including Garden of Lies, One Last Dance, and The Diary.
[0:53]Together they have sold over 6 million copies worldwide.
[0:57]Eileen draws from her own experiences in writing women's fiction, exploring recurring themes of sisterhood, friendship bonds,
[1:03]the joys and heartaches of romance and reversals of fortune.
[1:06]Eileen got her start as a ghostwriter for the popular teen series, Sweet Valley High, which spawned multiple spin-offs and a TV series.
[1:14]Between cooking up plots for her novels, Eileen can often be found in her kitchen, needing bread or rolling out pie dough.
[1:20]In 2005, she published a cookbook, Something Warm from the Oven, filled with family recipes and recipes contributed by readers.
[1:27]She lives with her husband, Sandy Kenyon, the former entertainment reporter, and film critic for WAVC TV and Sacramento.
[1:33]By the way, Sandy Kenyon had me on his show, I think four or five times and he is amazing.
[1:38]For more information, visit EileenGauge.com.
[1:41]Welcome, Eileen.
[1:42]Thank you so much for coming on mom's don't have time to read books to discuss all they need to know.
[1:47]A novel, congratulations. It's so fun to see you.
[1:50]Oh, I'm so glad to be here. It's funny because usually I listen to your podcast when I'm on the treadmill at the gym.
[1:59]So I feel like I should be on a treadmill.
[2:02]I mean, hop on. It's totally fine with me. I won't be upset.
[2:05]You and I have got some miles together.
[2:08]Thank you. That's great.
[2:12]I'm glad other people walk while I sit here and, you know, have my body just naturally spread out to fill my chair seats.
[2:20]So it's a great way to to work out and tighten your muscles while you're expanding your mind learning about books and other authors.
[2:28]That's that's just a great way to to make it all come together.
[2:34]Well, now you're giving me ideas about how I should partner with treadmill manufacturers.
[2:38]I'm going to write it down. See if I can get that going.
[2:40]Anyway, about your book. All they need to know, please tell listeners what it's about.
[2:46]Well, it's about a woman who's escaping her abusive husband and she reinvents herself as a police sketch artist and she draws lines to stop crimes as they say in the business.
[3:04]And she finds that very empowering and then she is put to the ultimate test when she has to stop the biggest and scariest criminal of all, which is her husband.
[3:16]Wow. So where did this come from and also talk about through the ensemble cast. I feel like this is such a visual narrative.
[3:26]Like I can see the whole thing. Like it's like still magnolias with like dirt roads or something.
[3:31]Like I can see the house and the tattoo and the whole thing. So talk a little bit about that.
[3:38]Okay. Well, she she relocates from the east coast of the west coast and she finds herself in this quaint California mountain town.
[3:47]She's befriended by this group of women who call themselves the tattoo ladies, but they're really not like side show circus tattoo ladies there.
[3:57]They met through one of the members who is a tattoo artist and that's how they know each other and the whole thing was inspired by my friendships and how meaningful they've been in my life.
[4:09]I belong to a group of women. We call ourselves the beach babes.
[4:14]We were all writers and we call it the beach babes came from the fact that we would met at a beach house in California every year for seven years until pandemic and then things kind of got scattered after that, but we're still very tight.
[4:32]And we come from all over the country. One for Canada. We're from different walks of life. We're different ages.
[4:40]And we're all just like we get together like a kids at a slumber party. We're just like sisters and we hang out in our PJs and we share our powder room,
[4:52]and businesses and laugh and cry and it's just so meaningful and I wanted to capture that and all they need to know I wanted to shine a light on how empowering friendships are in our lives.
[5:04]I think it's nice that you highlight it doesn't have to just be college girlfriends or something. You know, I mean, there's a lot written about the power of younger friendships and when you're together before you all are in marriages or this or that,
[5:18]like the friends that you make at a particular stage in life later in life is so unique as well and deserves a lot of ink.
[5:26]Well, it's just really interesting because at different points in your life, friends have different meanings and now that I'm older, I would be very sorry to only be friends with people my age because they started to die off.
[5:45]So I feel so blessed that I have friends, my kids ages and you know, but we're like sisters, it's not like I'm the mom and the group and nobody really thinks about age.
[5:58]and we just hang out and have fun and you know this way. My gosh, yes, I have younger people I can hang out with and the only time we're reminded of our ages in the difference in ages during our week at the beach.
[6:14]I was the only one who wasn't using tampons.
[6:19]Maybe swapping sanitary projects. I'm like, I'm done with all that.
[6:24]So in like in all they need to know, Kyra, Kyra, my heroine, you know, these women are also different ages and different, you know, different personalities and, but I try to mix it up, you know, not stereotype like one of the older ladies in the group is in her 60s.
[6:42]She's like the randyest and she's like the one, you know, dating and having a hot, you know sex life with online dating and you know, it just, you know, try to show that it's not stereotype people by age and so I hopefully capture that in the book.
[7:00]Tell me about the piece with domestic abuse and how obviously you have to be very careful writing about topics like this and tell me about the inspiration for that and how
[7:11]we are meant to sort of receive all of that and what we should do with information at the end.
[7:17]Yes, yes, you know, they say right what you know and I have always written what I know and I've been both blessed and cursed about a very interesting life and is in the Chinese curse may you live in interesting times.
[7:31]And at one point in my life, I was in an abusive relationship and that's where I, when I drew from that experience and writing this book.
[7:41]And like my character, I relocated from at that point from the West Coast to the East Coast and it was like, I don't know, I guess you'd have to have experienced what I did to know what it's like to live in a small town.
[7:57]We're not only your ex, but his whole family who hates you are sort of circling like sharks it feels like sometimes like you'll be able to stop at a red light and you'll look over at the driver and the car next to you and they're giving you the stink eye and it's your ex brother in law, you know, that kind of thing.
[8:16]So I really just had to get away and also I didn't feel safe. So I moved to the East Coast and I can't say I reinvented myself, but I sort of invented myself because at that point I was just a new writer and I was just starting to make some onions.
[8:32]I had no money. That's the other thing that I was totally broke and but I wrote my way out of poverty so speaking that's kind of what my character does.
[8:41]she takes, she has just limited resources and she has to she can't work in her profession because she's changed her name and then living under a false identity. Well, I didn't do that.
[8:53]I basically turned my whole life upside down and then I moved to New York and things started happening and I got some book contracts and boy, I don't know. I was in really crazy or stupid because I would never recommend anyone to just like, oh, hey, I'm going to be a writer and make my fortune, you know, how that goes.
[9:15]Most people like don't put your day job. So I was very lucky in that respect and so I really embraced the concept of reinvention, taking a bad thing that happened to you in life and turning it into something positive.
[9:32]And so, you know, in my novel, she, all you need, all they need to know that title comes from, she's keeping secrets and she doesn't want her friends to know that she came from this abusive relationship because that's the other thing that I wanted to talk about is the shame, victim shame.
[9:51]And I think those listening who've been there understand, you know, others might know.
[10:00]Oh, what do you have to be ashamed about?
[10:02]You were the victim and this person was abusing you.
[10:05]And, but you know, there's a shame and attached to,
[10:09]why didn't I leave soon?
[10:10]Why did I stay?
[10:12]Why did I put up with it for 10 years in my case?
[10:16]And you don't have a good answer.
[10:18]And so you feel embarrassed, you know,
[10:21]you don't want people to know that about yourself.
[10:24]And so it, that's the other theme of the novel
[10:28]was getting over that shame and getting,
[10:34]knowing that it wasn't her fault
[10:36]and that she was actually giving herself credit
[10:40]for getting out.
[10:41]And, and doesn't matter when you got out,
[10:44]it matters that you got out
[10:46]and that you found the strength to move on.
[10:48]And so that's really the other message of the book.
[10:51]And I hope others can take that.
[10:54]Anyone who's in that situation
[10:57]can take heart from that.
[10:59]I mean, I'm so sorry.
[11:00]I didn't know you had been through that yourself.
[11:02]And that's just terrible.
[11:03]I'm sorry.
[11:04]Well, you know, like I said, both blessed and cursed,
[11:07]because I was, I'm able to get in touch
[11:09]with those emotions to,
[11:12]I'm, you know, how it was at Nora Efern said about life.
[11:15]It's all copy.
[11:16]You know, everything that happened to me in life,
[11:19]I, you know, I can tap into those experiences
[11:23]and write I think a rich or better book from as a result.
[11:28]Like for instance, you know,
[11:32]previous point in my life,
[11:34]I was in desperate straits and I was a welfare mom.
[11:39]And I thought, well, I gotta do something, you know,
[11:42]to try to get out of the situation.
[11:44]That's when I started writing.
[11:47]That's what was the inspiration for my whole writing career.
[11:50]It was just, I got to get out of the situation.
[11:54]And then I ended up in another bad situation.
[11:56]But you know, it's interesting,
[11:58]when my first novel came out and this was in the 80s,
[12:00]are in the lies.
[12:01]And I had occasion to have a chat with an editor
[12:05]who was promoting the fact that one of her authors
[12:09]who was, they were, she had just launched one of her big book
[12:12]and was marketing it and doing publicity.
[12:16]Just all the poor woman, she lives in the suburbs.
[12:18]And yeah, she's married to the same guy
[12:21]for her high school sweetheart.
[12:23]And she's just got this perfect life.
[12:25]And there's nothing to her to talk about on talk shows.
[12:28]And I'm like, hey, book me on your show,
[12:32]welfare mom to millionaire.
[12:34]You know, it was so.
[12:37]And I guess sort of ironic, you know what I mean.
[12:42]Wow.
[12:43]Well, I don't want you to have to dwell in those times.
[12:46]But I am curious, when you say it was abusive for 10 years
[12:50]and then you got out, can you give us just a little more?
[12:54]Like what was it physical?
[12:56]Like did something happen?
[12:57]Was it, how did you, when did you know it would be,
[13:00]you know, I think that's the other thing.
[13:01]When you read books or all of this, like the signs were there,
[13:05]but when did it start and did it progress slowly?
[13:08]Like, you know, the rabbit with the water
[13:10]getting turned up or the frog or the analogy?
[13:13]Like how did, and how did you get the strength to leave?
[13:15]What was the tipping point?
[13:17]Well, it's interesting to get me back to what you're saying
[13:19]for about when did I know?
[13:20]I actually knew before I married him, which I think it was like,
[13:26]I having been a welfare mom.
[13:29]I was so kind of beaten down and felt so unworthy, I guess.
[13:34]And I guess I just didn't feel like I deserve better.
[13:42]And also, I was young enough to think I could change him.
[13:47]And I think that's the biggest fault to tell ourselves is, you know what?
[13:52]You ain't changing nobody.
[13:53]If you marry, what you're marrying is what you got, you know?
[13:58]And I didn't know that at the time.
[14:00]And he was never physically abusive in the sense that he didn't hit me.
[14:06]But he would be, you know, getting to these rages
[14:11]and you'd be screaming at you.
[14:14]And next thing you know, a fist flies back, an inch from your face
[14:19]and puts a hole in them all behind you, that kind of thing.
[14:22]Where you're constantly afraid and, you know,
[14:25]he was constantly having these drunken rages, you know?
[14:30]And it was interesting because I thought, I was, I used to pray, you know,
[14:34]that's the other thing, if you're an abusive relationship,
[14:37]you hope the neighbors don't know.
[14:40]And, you know, I didn't know how much they were aware of.
[14:45]But after I finally got rid of him, got him to leave, I don't know how I did that.
[14:51]But through Hooker, Mike Crook, they say.
[14:55]And this lady from Crosses Street, who had never really had much to do with her,
[15:00]she was kind of an older woman and she didn't come out of the house very often.
[15:05]She came out of her house and walked across the street,
[15:09]which was kind of a big deal because, like I said, she had some mobility issues.
[15:13]She said, listen, honey, I'm with you.
[15:16]If you need anyone to testify in court, I've seen it all.
[15:21]And then I realized, of course, the neighbor knew everything.
[15:25]I wasn't hiding anything from anyone.
[15:28]Doesn't.
[15:29]Yeah.
[15:32]I'm not going to ask.
[15:33]So how did you get out?
[15:36]I know you said by Hooker, by Crook, but really, because so many people are stuck.
[15:42]Well, it's interesting.
[15:43]I just tried to think of a way.
[15:46]And I finally, what the impetus was a close writing friend of mine
[15:52]has a similar situation.
[15:54]And then she finally got rid of her husband.
[15:56]He was also a drunken guy who's similar to Mike, but I don't think he was angry.
[16:04]But she finally got rid of him.
[16:06]And I was so jealous.
[16:08]I was like, now I have no one likes in the trenches with me.
[16:13]And then I realized, oh my god, I'm alone.
[16:15]I got to just, I got to do this.
[16:17]So I got also for the sake of my kids.
[16:19]I had two young children at the time.
[16:22]And so I somehow convinced them that the only chance our marriage had
[16:27]as if he moved out and we can see if we could work it out.
[16:31]You know, just whatever wilds I had to use to get them out.
[16:35]And then once he was out, you know, I thought locking the doors
[16:38]would do it, but then he broke in, so I had to change the locks.
[16:42]That's what I realized I really just have to move and get out of this town.
[16:47]And that's what led me to New York and my whole career in New York.
[16:51]Actually, now I'm back to my roots.
[16:53]I'm living in California again.
[16:56]My husband Sandy and I, my adorable husband, who's like the prince that came
[17:02]at the end of all the years, I was earlier Cinderella's story.
[17:08]And anyway, so we're living in Sacramento and looking out my free trees
[17:14]in the backyard.
[17:15]So there was a happy ending to my story.
[17:17]Of course, Sandy Kenyon is like the nicest guy ever.
[17:20]Friends to everyone in the world.
[17:23]I can't imagine him hurting a fly.
[17:25]And he's so bored to you.
[17:27]Oh my gosh, I mean, you know, every time you just pray.
[17:32]He's actually when I met him, I was like, I'm never getting married again.
[17:37]No, this is just like, I'm just not cut out for this.
[17:41]And, you know, obviously my pickers broke and all that.
[17:45]And he said something that resonated with me said, you know, you've been with
[17:49]a man who made your life more difficult.
[17:53]And I'm the guy who's going to make it easier.
[17:55]And I'm like, oh, sure right.
[17:58]I didn't believe him because I've never had that experience.
[18:04]I've only ever had guys who were obstructionist or man babies or, you know, you name it.
[18:12]And here's this like real man who was like a real friend and a hell of me.
[18:17]And so that was the only thing I tapped into in writing all they need to know.
[18:23]Kyra falls in love where she tries not to in the early stages of their relationship
[18:29]with her landlord who's very, you know, attractive, obviously.
[18:35]And she's attracted to him, but she doesn't feel like she's ready.
[18:38]You know, she can't, she's been burned.
[18:40]And she doesn't think like I thought she thought her picker was broke and that nothing
[18:46]good could come of this and, but he's like, I based him on Sandy, you know, because
[18:51]he's very steady and he's helping her and, you know, finally, she realizes, hey, maybe
[18:57]this could work.
[18:58]And so yeah, her story, I shouldn't give away.
[19:03]I'm being a spoiler here and all of my stories and have a satisfying ending.
[19:11]I should say.
[19:13]The other thing I want to say is that my mantra in life is kind of just what it served me
[19:20]well, but when I'm in a tough situation or I'm faced with a challenge, I say to myself, you can
[19:29]do hard things.
[19:31]And that's the one thing my all of characters, the heroines and all my books have in common,
[19:36]they do hard things, even when they feel like they can't, even when they feel like
[19:43]they're just, it's too much for them to overcome an obstacle.
[19:47]You know, they do hard things.
[19:49]You need to have like blurb your book or something.
[19:54]All do hard things to say that to yourself and believe it.
[20:00]You know, it's true.
[20:01]You can do more than you think you can.
[20:04]Especially you racing away, saving yourself
[20:08]with your young children to come to New York,
[20:11]to be a writer and then actually doing it
[20:14]and being a lifelong career writer
[20:17]with so many books.
[20:18]I mean, it's astounding.
[20:21]It's a story in and of itself, right?
[20:23]What happened to both of you written
[20:25]or ghost written or whatever?
[20:27]You'll get a kick out of this.
[20:28]So when I first moved to New York,
[20:30]I couldn't afford to live in Manhattan.
[20:32]I was gluing off the proceeds from my,
[20:36]the teen romance as I was thriving.
[20:38]I was one of the original writers of Sweet Valley High,
[20:41]the series of teen series.
[20:43]So I ended up somebody said,
[20:45]well, there are affordable rentals in Brooklyn
[20:50]and Chuck the Jewish press.
[20:52]And so I checked and I thought,
[20:54]way, there's sure a lot, I found something in Midwood,
[20:57]eventually, which is the heart of Brooklyn.
[21:00]I thought, boy, this realtor, show her Chavez certainly
[21:03]has a lot of listings and show her Chavez
[21:08]for those of you who aren't Jewish and don't speak Jewish
[21:11]means, you know, subs observers only.
[21:14]And I didn't know that I thought it was the name
[21:15]of the realtor.
[21:16]Oh my gosh.
[21:18]So I ended up flying for this,
[21:20]it was like a walk up in a two family house
[21:24]and the landlady and her husband,
[21:27]were, he was a rabbi and she was, you know,
[21:31]very orthodox wound with a,
[21:32]she wore a traditional marriage wig and everything.
[21:36]And she said, oh, gosh, you know, you're seen so nice,
[21:39]but we don't really brand to like,
[21:41]she didn't say non-Jews,
[21:43]but she said, people who don't celebrate, you know,
[21:46]sobbing, don't keep, you know, observers out.
[21:49]And so I was like, oh, you know,
[21:51]I was trying to throw myself through Rosie,
[21:54]but she said, well, come on in as a cold day
[21:56]and have a cup of tea.
[21:57]So we sat in her kitchen, talked at the end.
[21:59]She said, you know, I never do this.
[22:01]And we don't do this in general in our community,
[22:04]but I really like you and your kids are the same age
[22:06]as my kids.
[22:07]I think it would be so she rented me the apartment.
[22:11]And that was, we became like best friends.
[22:16]And that's the other thing I was saying,
[22:18]goes back to what I was saying earlier is,
[22:21]I just, it's so important to me to have not just friends
[22:25]from, you know, different ages, but diverse friends,
[22:28]you know, I'm just so fascinated by other cultures.
[22:31]And I probably know more about kosher,
[22:34]keeping kosher than any non-Jew than you've ever met,
[22:39]just from hanging out my friend, Fabie's kitchen.
[22:42]Wow, what a story.
[22:44]Well, Eileen, I'm so excited for you.
[22:46]The story is so hopeful.
[22:48]It's funny, it's immersive, it reads like a movie.
[22:53]It's gonna be great.
[22:55]I mean, I'm just so excited for you.
[22:57]And your reinvention story and how it just keeps
[23:01]ticking on and you're happy ending and all of it.
[23:03]It's just very inspiring.
[23:05]I hope other readers can take hope from it.
[23:08]I know it's a novel, mainly I want people to be entertained,
[23:12]but I do also, you know, that would be a nice thing
[23:16]for readers to take hope from it.
[23:19]I'm sure they will, 100%.
[23:22]Thank you so much, Eileen.
[23:23]Thanks for coming on.
[23:25]Oh, my pleasure.
[23:27]Bye-bye.
[23:28]Okay, bye.
[23:31]Thanks for listening to Mom's Don't Have Time to Read Books.
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[23:35]And follow us on social at city Owens and at city readers.