The Price of Pleasure

Rating:
Summary: Sexy, But . . . .
Review: Erika Holland is New York's most notorious madam. She caters to the very, very rich and makes quite a killing ($$$) doing it. Her girls (and boys -- after all, sex is an equal opportunity experience!) are all devoted to her. She's got a great guy who loves her who just happens to be the one who got her started in the business (but he's a regular joe, a partner in some international investment firm who is not even a customer!). She's surrounded by people who think being a madam or a prostitute is just like being a lawyer or a doctor. Basically, she's the world's nicest, most stable person who just happens to run an upscale brothel.

One night, coming home from a "date", Erika is involved in a car accident and, as she lies comatose in a New York hospital surrounded by her friends and employees, we learn how she came to be a madam. She was once, in her former life, a wife and mother. Her husband (Rick) was a cookie-cutter investment-type who we know only through Erika's clouded eyes. After Rick runs off to Switzerland with his gold-digging assistant, Sandy, Erika is left with no money, mounting debts, and a teenage daughter who hates her. Rick's coup de grace is focing Erika to choose between having Rick pay for her daughter's education (only in France) or losing all child support if Erika brings Rena back to the States. Erika becomes an escort as a way to make money and finds that she likes the sex and likes the companionship. Eventually, she takes over the whole business from Valerie, who is getting married to a former customer.

While Erika is in a coma, her grown up (and very resentful) daughter, Rena, comes back to New York to find that her mother is a madam. Understandably, she is furious, but in just a few short days (basically, in the time it takes her mother to come out of her coma) she comes around to accepting her mother and her friends. It helps that she has a night of hot steamy sex with Alex, one of Courtsans, Inc.'s hunky male prostitutes.

The problem I had with this book isn't about the sex or about the author's attitude towards sex (which is empowering and progressive), it's simply that these people seem way too normal to be real. There are two married prostitutes in the book (one is Valerie, the former madam of Courtesans, Inc.) whose husbands know about the work and accept it, one woman with a committed relationship (Erika), and one woman who is courting or is being courted by a doctor (who also knows what she does for a living). In the real world, people aren't so accepting of prostitutes. It may be an "ideal" world the author is painting, but it certainly makes the story lack depth. No one sturggles with a conscience. No one passes judgment (which is fine, excpet it's unrealistic). It's just too perky and perfect.

Rating:
Summary: clever erotic tale
Review: The taxi that she rides in as a passenger traveling the icy roads of Manhattan crashes leaving Erika Holland in a coma. Her last conscious thought focuses on the smiling face of friend Stuart Dunlap.

In her comatose state Erika thinks back to how she became a Manhattan call girl catering to the wealthy, promoted to a Madam, and eventually CEO of Courtesans, Inc. Erika was a contented spouse whose husband deserted her for Europe and his younger assistant. He threatened to cut Erika off from even child support if she failed to tow the mark. Innocently at first Erika found pleasuring men a delight that also brought in income. Though she can have almost any upper class male she chooses (for an evening) all Erika craves most in the world are the love of her daughter who hates and scorns her, and a smiling individual who deserves better than a fortyish hooker. She has neither as she lies in the coma.

As expected by an erotic tale, profanity and graphic sex scenes are as prolific as some of the charcaters are promiscuous. The story line is told in alternating dialogue, yet much of the plot is a cleverly designed first person account as the audience sees the "flashback" events through the relative eyes of Erika, an enlightened and delightful protagonist. Though the males seem so easily embracing prostitution to the point of matrimony and marriage proposals, readers will gain much pleasure (reading silly) from the entertaining The Price of Pleasure.

Harriet Klausner

Rating:
Summary: clever erotic tale
Review: The taxi that she rides in as a passenger traveling the icy roads of Manhattan crashes leaving Erika Holland in a coma. Her last conscious thought focuses on the smiling face of friend Stuart Dunlap.

In her comatose state Erika thinks back to how she became a Manhattan call girl catering to the wealthy, promoted to a Madam, and eventually CEO of Courtesans, Inc. Erika was a contented spouse whose husband deserted her for Europe and his younger assistant. He threatened to cut Erika off from even child support if she failed to tow the mark. Innocently at first Erika found pleasuring men a delight that also brought in income. Though she can have almost any upper class male she chooses (for an evening) all Erika craves most in the world are the love of her daughter who hates and scorns her, and a smiling individual who deserves better than a fortyish hooker. She has neither as she lies in the coma.

As expected by an erotic tale, profanity and graphic sex scenes are as prolific as some of the charcaters are promiscuous. The story line is told in alternating dialogue, yet much of the plot is a cleverly designed first person account as the audience sees the "flashback" events through the relative eyes of Erika, an enlightened and delightful protagonist. Though the males seem so easily embracing prostitution to the point of matrimony and marriage proposals, readers will gain much pleasure (reading silly) from the entertaining The Price of Pleasure.

Harriet Klausner