Review: Reminiscent of Sidney Sheldon's plots!
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 03 31, 2014
It's been a while since I've read a story that is not a romance or non-fiction...and this book transported me back to those edge-of-your-seat reads I dug into in the past, especially the ones from the likes of Sidney Sheldon. There was a definite Sheldon vibe to this tale - in the 'naked' portrayal of these characters, in the desperation interlaced into their characterization, in the spiral-downward trend they all took.... Would redemption be waiting down that slide? How would they each end up? Happy ending? Sad ending? Tragic ending? Especially when you bear in kind the very opening paragraphs of this book, there the sugar daddy tells you that he's been involved in all three women's lives - one spirit he broke, one's neck he broke, and the other one he married....Who is he? That is the question that had me turning the pages throughout this book. I really, really hoped the author would not let me down by not wrapping it all up or stringing us along with a mystery (especially when it looked like no one was going to get married!), but then you reach close to the end....and suddenly you wonder how you did not see all this coming! It's a facepalm moment, because it all falls into place.That being said, some things did annoy me in this story. The level of repetition, for one (the woman whose POV we're in says something, then 2-3 lines down, she says the same thing again in slightly different wording, then next page you get the same message again). And whenever the focus was on Niki, the read kinda dragged. Yes, this might've been necessary to 'explain' all that going on with Niki, but some points did feel tedious to slug through, and it is only the need to explain the mystery of THE sugar daddy's identity that kept me reading.But all in all, this was an engrossing read, especially with the feel of these "lifestyle in all its glory and darkness" aspects that made Sidney Sheldon's books such page turners. There's an aura of sinister throughout this read that remains just on the edges, a darkness that is threatening to encroach, all while there is a brilliant expose about the condition of women and feminism in today's world that is 'explained' throughout the lives, motives, and plights of these sugar babies.