The Critical Response

 

PUBLISHERS WEEKLY: “Aimed at the literate reader…this collaboration is timely, intelligent, witty…. Martha will be an appealing and very contemporary heroine to those who are sensitive to the price of feminine ‘liberation’…. Readers who crave sophisticated popular fiction…will undoubtedly be beguiled.”

 

NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW (Nora Johnson): “Wittily told…. I loved Martha’s wit and regretted the occasional old whine – ‘All my life I have tried to do what was expected…. All that I’ve left out is me.’  Though the author’s [sic] wordplay can get a little exhausting, this is a thoroughly enjoyable novel.”

 

KIRKUS SERVICE: “A wry, funny, extravagantly knowledgeable romp through the interior-decorating business, both small-scale exurb and Manhattan glitz-celeb…. With lots of on-the-job specifics, from sedate townhouses to Mafia-tinged banks; a lively, often hilarious, stud-and-beam view of a bewitching – and witchy – business.” [Starred review]

 

SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE-EXAMINER (Alix Madrigal):
[B]right and sassy and entertaining novels about suburban housewives are legion. A new one, Good Goods, by husband and wife team Phyllis and Richard Kluger…features the prerequisite sharp and funny heroine …. It is distinguished by a funny and knowing bitchiness directed at corporate types, suburbanites, beautiful people, and interior decorators – easy shots all, but amusing nonetheless.”

 

THE BOOKLIST (American Library Association): “The Klugers spin a thoroughly delightful yarn about the frantic and oftentimes funny routine of Connecticut-housewife-turned-interior decorator Martha Clement…. A sprightly, comic story of romance and personal relationships.”

 

LIBRARY JOURNAL (Barbara Halfen): “Martha Clement…is an amusing, believable character…. Her freshness, wit, and intelligence save Good Goods from becoming merely one of a long list of novels with the all-too-familiar theme of the middle-aged woman in the throes of an identity crisis…. Recommended.”

 

INDIANAPOLIS STAR (Bruce Lawrason): “That the novel comes off as a romp with several well-delivered messages might be too much to expect with less talented writing…. The mingling of humorous anecdotal events with the main and subordinate plots proceeds with consummate skill…. Even the reader who might have trouble caring less about interior design will enjoy reading Good Goods….”

 

NEW HAVEN REGISTER (Kit Reed): “Connecticut-based writers Phyllis and Richard Kluger have collaborated so well on this witty excursion into middle-class, mid-life mores that that it leaves the reader wondering who did which parts….”