Author Spotlight: Dorothy Eden

Author Spotlight: Dorothy Eden 

(Dorothy Enid Eden)
New Zealand (1912 - 1982)

aka Mary Paradise

Dorothy Enid Eden (1912 - 1982) was a novelist and short story writer. She was born April 3, 1912 in Canterbury Plains, New Zealand, where she attended school and worked as a legal secretary before moving to England in 1954.

Eden was best known for her writings in the historical, suspense, and Gothic genres. In addition to writing novels, she also contributed to magazines, including Redbook and Good Housekeeping.

She authored over 40 novels, is known for her suspenseful plots and authentic historical details. Her works are also known for background "spookiness", which this type of writing is all about.

Most Popular Books

• The American Heiress
• Sleep in the Woods
• An Important Family
• The Bird in the Chimney
• The Brooding Lake
  

The earliest title I could find was The Laughing Ghost (1943), with the latest written in 1982 (An Important Family). Titles were being re-issued as late as 2013.

A sampling:

• A woman moves from Venice to an English manor that has a past (Winterwood)
• A daring American heiress in Victorian England and gilded age New York (The Millionaire's Daughter)
• The disembodied voice on the phone has a small favor to ask...(Yellow is for Fear)
• A street woman is rescued and falls in love with a nobleman and finds herself in more danger than the street at his haunted country estate (Ravenscroft)
• getting caught up in dark family secrets at an eerie Irish castle (Whistle for the Crows)
• a spine-tingling tale of a woman confronted with an English manor's shadowed and violent past (Darkwater)
• Secrets haunt an English family in New Zealand (An Important Family)
• A young wife and mother begins to question her sanity after a spate of mysterious occurrences (An Afternoon Walk)
• A mysterious phone call thrusts a woman into a suffocating atmosphere of terror (Listen to Danger)

There's too much drama here in just the descriptions.....I am already swooning! The women in the stories have great soap opera names such as Cressida Barclay, Christabel Spencer and Briar Johnson. For fans of these romantic suspense Gothics they seem to be readily available in thrift shops or in odd lots on internet sites that sell books. (You might also look in your grandmothers bookshelves.) These books and the original corresponding covers remind me of the 1970's era and are as much a product of their time as flower power, disco, and polyester leisure suits. Happy reading.

Similar authors: Victoria Holt, Phyllis Whitney and Susan Howatch