The Scottish star Susan Boyle retained her position at number 1 in Billboard’s list of top-selling albums across all musical genres, while Adam Lambert’s “For your Entertainment” entered last week at number 3.

Lambert came to national attention when he made it to the finals of American Idol earlier this year. Like Susan, he impressed the harsh British critic Simon Cowell, who gave him a standing ovation.

Since winning American Idol Lambert has had some negative attention, shocking viewers with his raunchy antics on the American Music Awards, when he appeared to kiss a male member of the band and simulated sexual gestures onstage. Despite media and viewer outrage Lambert did not apologize. "I'm not a babysitter, I'm a performer," he said on CBS's The Early Show, saying the criticism was part of a double standard because he was gay.

None of this seems to have harmed Lambert’s album sales, which had reached almost 200,000 by Friday. But Susan Boyle is still well above that, at just under 701,000. It’s a better first week than any other album this year, eclipsing the previous record of Eminem’s “Relapse,” which sold 608,000 in May according to the Wall Street Journal.  MTV has reported that this makes her album “I Dreamed A Dream” the highest debut of a female artist since the current Soundscan system of measuring sales.

It looks like it will be a very merry Christmas for Susan.