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Penny for your thoughts

Romance queen Penny Jordan

Penny Jordan is a name that a large majority of the urban female population in India is familiar with. The romantic yarns spun by her have warmed the cockles of many a heart. The tales told by her, the mushy romantic kind that are fondly referred to as MBs (Mills and Boon novellas), have a fan following to rival the best of storytellers. And her admirers run across a wide spectrum of readership — tender-hearted teenaged girls, hard-nosed businesswomen, stay-at-home moms, cynical-for-the-world women who still like reading her on the sly, and of course, merry grandmothers who love sharing her books with their granddaughters.

We ask Penny if Mills and Boon romances have changed in content and substance with the changing romance and marriage realities. She feels the basic premise of the MBs remains the same in that the couple have to work to resolve problems that separate them before they are able to find happiness together. “My couples have to make a decision that their love for one another is more important to them than the differences that keep them apart.”

Penny’s first MB was published in the early eighties. With the world becoming a global village and inter-racial marriages being quite common, the world of MBs has also changed. Penny Jordan’s Virgin for the Billionaire’s Taking has an Indian hero. “I love romance but no longer read it as I fear accidentally ‘copying’ another romance author’s plot,” she reveals.

As for romance in her own life, the 62-year-old Penny discloses that she is widowed now but was married for almost 30 years and had known her husband since they were teenagers. “I am rather an idealist, my late husband was a very kind gentle man, very intelligent and very proud of me because of my writing. I shall always miss him,” she tells us.

KOMAL VIJAY SINGH

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