Jo Rees published her first novel when she was 26. She went on to write several screenplays and internationally successful novels with her husband, Emlyn Rees, including the number one bestseller, Come Together.
Her first solo project was the bestselling Platinum. It's the big, juicy, glamorous read she's always wanted to write. Her next novel, Forbidden Pleasures, will be published in August 2010.Jo lives with her husband and their three daughters by the sea.
Me encanta, una historia que le hace justicia a nuestra astucia, inteligencia y capacidad; cuidado con fastidiar a una mujer, no digo a tres. Me divertí con la bribonería de Peaches, con la persistencia de Frankie y los inteligentes comentarios de Emma; sus historias son duras cada una a su manera, pero me encanta su inteligencia, carisma y capacidad de enfrentar lo que la vida les pone y no quedarse retozando en el rol de víctimas. Toca un tema que nos duele y que está profundamente arraigado en nuestras sociedades, la violencia intra familiar, el patriarcado poderoso que dispone de nosotras las mujeres como si fuéramos ciudadanas y seres humanos de segunda; lo expone desde el punto de vista del hombre violento, del hombre que se cree superior intelectualmente y desde el celoso que siempre elige creer lo peor.
I love it, a story that does justice to our cunning, intelligence and ability; Beware of annoying a woman, I do not say three. I had fun with rogue Peaches, with Frankie's persistence and Emma's smart mouth; Their stories are hard each in their own way, but I love their intelligence, charm and ability to face what life puts on them and not to frolic in the role of victims. It touches a subject that hurts us and that is deeply rooted in our societies, intra-family violence, the powerful patriarchy that women have as if we were citizens and second-class human beings; he exposes it from the point of view of the violent man, of the man who thinks himself superior intellectually and from the jealous one who always chooses to believe the worst.
Platinum follows three very different women: Peaches, a tough prostitute and the most influential madam of Los Angeles, Emma, a middle-aged aristocrat and Frankie, a young tech genius working at a luxury yacht of a Russian millionaire. The stories of these women end up tangled with one another when they realise their lives have been ruined by the same man, a russian billionaire oligarch named Yuri Khordinsky.
Platinum was a fun book. It was engaging and kept me turning the pages, and it did have some solid twists and turns. It's a perfect book to read if you want something a bit outlandish, a bit tragic, a bit romantic, a bit scandalous and just something to help you turn off your brain and forget your daily stress. It wasn't the greatest, most outstanding piece of literature I've read, but I didn't expect it to be so I wasn't disappointed. I was a bit surprised with how the book included some rather tough topics such as child trafficking, sexual violence and other kinds of extreme types of violence: I expected the book to, yeah, feature violence (how could a story about women taking down an evil oligarch not feature some?) but I didn't expect major plotlines to involve stuff like sexual abuse of children. Platinum is an entertaining read, but it's not always the easiest: there were some scenes and backstories that made me feel quite uncomfortable and they were difficult to read sometimes, as plot lines with these themes should be. So, just keep that in mind if this story seems intriguing to you.
I enjoyed all three of the main characters. Peaches had a cool story arc and I enjoyed seeing her find out about her past and confront her traumas. I liked how headstrong, shameless and tough she was, and how she, despite having been through so much horrible shit, was able to make a life for herself and never allowed anyone else to control her actions. I also really loved her journey of Frankie and Emma had solid arcs as well. I liked how different all three women were and how each had a very distinct voice and personality. There were aspects I liked and disliked about all of them, which I like in fictional characters. I rooted for them from the beginning to take down Yuri, who was, no surprise, a total disgusting monster.
As I said, the plot had some good twists and turns, and I enjoyed the arcs of all our leading ladies. It made me happy that, after all they were put through, I also liked how the story took its time before getting into the revenge plot because that allowed the reader to get to know these women and why and how they end up wronged by Yuri. I liked how different their reasons were: A smaller twist I ended up really liking was that
Now, on to some of my gripes.
One of the blurbs on the Finnish translation of the book said the book is full of hot men and even hotter sex, and, well, I didn't quite get that. I won't go into the sex scenes - other than I have to say that there were a few sentences that I wish I had never read (though part of that is due to the Finnish language and my inability to handle sex scenes written in Finnish or take them seriously) - but the men? Where were the hot men? The novel's romantic male lead was just okay, and yeah, there were times he and his love interest were quite cute, but then he also felt way too possessive sometimes. Sure, I rooted for him and his lady love to get together, but he was definitely not the hunk the blurb promised me.
The book was published in 2008, so it is no wonder that there are some questionable language and terms used to describe minorities, especially queer people. There was a lot of describing people of color as exotic and all that kind of stuff, but the most uncomfortable moments were with queer folk. There were some uncomfortable descriptions of trans women and how they looked almost perfectly like women except for their genitals, and Peaches once asked her gay friend if he did any "bisexual stuff", as if bisexuality is some kind of act or sexual fetish. They were little things, but they did irk me. I didn't feel like there was any malice on the author's part, but she definitely made some iffy wording choices.
All in all, I liked this book way more than I thought I would. I was looking for a silly, over-the-top revenge romp, but I ended up quite invested in the story and these women's lives. I don't think I will go out of my way to read anything more from this author or more books like this one, but I'm happy to see that I can enjoy all kinds of stories. This wouldn't be the first book I recommend, but honestly, go for it if it seems interesting.
Platinum focuses on the lives of 3 women all scorned by one man and how their lives were ruined by the evil Yuri Khordinsky.
Frankie is a computer-whizz, but due to something that happened to her at home in South Africa, she’s now a stewardess on board Pushkin, a yacht owned by rich businessman Alex. But when Frankie gets to know Alex better, is her life ever going to be the same? Peaches Gold is a high-class prostitute, running her own female-escort service (to put it politely!), and she knows secrets about the biggest names in Hollywood, but does someone know a secret about her? Finally, Lady Emma Harvey lives in England with her husband, who’s about to open a Platinum mine in Russia.
But when Emma is shocked to her core, will she get to the bottom of what really happened? The three women are unlikely allies, but they decide together, they have to bring down Yuri Khordinsky and make him pay for the tragedies he has caused.
Being a story that has 3 main characters, the author Jo Rees has written the book in the third person and has chosen to dedicate a chapter at a time to each character, allowing us to get a good glimpse into their lives and the background story before diving into the main crux of the story. This allows us to develop a likeness for all 3 of the characters, show us their differences and engross yourself a bit in the unbelievably glamourous lives of the three women. I immediately warmed to Frankie, found Emma a little hard to like but loved Peaches because she was so outrageous! All 3 are incredibly different, each living in a different part of the world; Frankie on the boat in the Carribean and Marrakesh, Peaches in LA and Emma in England, adding to the sumptuousness of the novel!
You can probably tell from the storyline that this isn’t a novel set in the “real world” with realistic characters – each of them lives a life most of us could only dream about, but I quite enjoy this style of book actually! It’s nice to occasionally be transported out of your day to day life of being a mum around the world to Marrakesh, to the Cannes Film Festival, the dark depths of Moscow and the staely homes of London all in one novel as well! Rees really does a great job in bringing these places to life in the story, making you feel as if you are there with the three women, living the life of luxury! And this is what I really loved – the author has a great ability to make you dream about these places and really visualise them, which makes the novel just a fantastic read overall.
The story is primarily a revenge story, but I will say that it did take a while to get into the whole reason for the revenge against Yuri, and what exactly happened to the women to make them want revenge. In a way, I preferred this as you could get to know the characters well enough, and then when they were wronged, you wanted them to win against Khordinsky’s character and therefore you get passionate about it, despite how silly it might seem. I did wonder how Rees would be able to weave 3 totally different characters together in a way which would work, but she has done just that. They knit nicely together when required, but not in a sickly sweet way, purely in a business/revenge sense and this works for the purpose of this book.
I didn’t expect to like this book to be honest, because it sounded somewhat unrealistic and a little bit silly, but once I started reading it, I just didn’t want to put it down! I was desperate to know what was going to happen to the women to make them want revenge, and then after that, I wanted to see how they were going to exact their revenge on him. The characters were strong, likeable women who were incredibly well written, the places in the story were well written and I loved travelling the world in one book.There were nice characters, horrible Russian mafia characters, American FBI officers and posh society friends, and each of them helped make the book a rich world that the reader can really imagine and get involved in! It’s a fun read, a real page turner and I’d definitely recommend it as a great summer read!
I must say that I picked this book out of a "book bin" for $3... It was supposed to be a full in until the book I wanted arrived. However it was great! I read it in 2 days... I was blushing in the first chapter and trapped in this book by the second. Well worth a read. I'm currently googling Jo Rees other books.
Een prachtig complot . Drie verhalen over drie vrouwen . Op het einde verweven de verhalen zich met elkaar . Zo zie je maar dat roem en faam niet eeuwig is en dat geld niet altijd gelukkig maakt . De Russische maffie is ook wereldbekend en ook dit is in het verhaal verwerkt op een geloofswaardige manier
This book was written 16 years ago but still holds up well today. A great and fast moving story about 3 very different ladies who are wronged by a Russian villain. I've enjoyed hearing how each one was double crossed or just wronged by the villain, how they met and how they eventually ended up. Quite an epic book and so well worth the read. I understand it was this authors first solo book and it is really very well written. Some great strong characters and beautifully described locations. A bit violent in places but not awfully so. I will certainly look out for more books by this author.
Es un libro sobre el encuentro de tres mujeres que sin saberlo han compartido vida paralelas con un punto en común: un mismo hombre. Un libro sobre venganza entretenido pero que no recuerdo que tenga más.
Lento, muy lento, infinitamente lento y a última hora a resolverlo todo a caber abierta. Además de eso una historia de amor baboso de por medio y otra que se ve venir a la legua.
Comencé a leer el libro algo asustada por el grosor del mismo pero una vez que cogí el hilo de la historia se me fue haciendo cada vez más corto. Platino nos narra la vida de tres mujeres completamente diferentes entre sí y de orígen muy distinto. Una entrenadora personal que trabaja en un yate de lujo, una aristocrata inglesa y una rica madama de Hollywood. Sin embargo, estas tres mujeres tienen algo en común. El capo de la mafia rusa, Kordinski, ha arruinado la vida de ellas tres, quienes tratarán de vengarse y se cruzarán accidentalmente en el camino, forjando una gran amistad. Los oscuros secretos que guarda el mafioso ruso, el oscuro y borroso pasado de la madama, la dura vida de la entrenadora y la depresión en que se hunde la aristócrata por una pérdida reciente harán que saquen fuerzas de flaqueza y comiencen a investigar y darse cuenta que no todo se deja al destino y que fuerzas externas han influido deliberadamente en sus vidas. En la lucha de ellas tres por la venganza veremos que lo que las impulsa a seguir con su plan es el amor en sus diferentes facetas: el amor de madre y esposa, el amor de hija y el amor a primera vista. He disfrutado de la novela porque va contando alternativamente la vida de cada una de las tres para luego hilvanarlas todas con indescriptible sutileza para que al final todas las piezas encajen. El final que, para algunos puede ser algo previsible, para mí ha sido tocar el cielo pues había sentido el sufrimiento de las protagonistas y quería que consiguieran su objetivo. En este libro, encontraréis diferentes ambitos sociales desde una sociedad rígida y estirada que sigue las reglas de etiqueta, pasando por el machismo y brusquedad de la mafia rusa y rozar tintes eróticos con la vida "alegre" de la madama y sus prostitutas. Le recomiendo a todo aquel que quiera dar un giro de temática en sus lecturas.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Chicklit kan heel fijn zijn om te lezen. Dit is chicklit gecombineerd met actie en dat maakt het problematisch. In veel chicklit zit er wel iets van empowerment, maar vaak draait het toch ook om een vrouw die een man adoreert. In dit boek gaat het om drie vrouwen die drie mannen adoreren en dat dan gecombineerd met moord, actie en huichelarij. En dat levert niet okee-je situaties op. Toch moet ik toegeven dat ik bij dit boek gehuild en gelachen heb toch en dat ik het ook spannend vond.
Spoiler alert: De meest problematische situatie: Eén van de drie hoofdpersonen was gedrogeerd en ontvoerd. Ze kreeg een foto toegestuurd waarop ze naakt vastgebonden zat en de mannen bij haar poseerden en deden alsof ze met haar zoenden (er had geen verkrachting plaatsgevonden overigens). De hoofdpersoon wist dat de foto opgestuurd zou worden naar haar love-interest. De eerste gedachten die ze daardoor bij het zien van de foto was "Nu denkt hij dat ik vreemd ben gegaan en hem niet meer wil." WHAT THE FUCK JO REES!!! PS: Ik las dit boek omdat het het lievelingsboek is van een vriendinnetje van mij en dat snap ik ook wel want ik heb er dus gek genoeg ook nog wel van genoten.
This was great! I love the way the novel followed three very different women and slowly merged their lives together by the awful acts of one man. The characters were well established and likeable and I also loved the ending (which is quite rare). Fantastic fiction piece and I can't wait to read more of Jo Rees's works!
No tämähän oli tämmöinen peruskesälomakirja, jossa neuvokkaat naiset ryhtyvät kostopuuhiin ja luonnollisesti loistokkaissa ympyröissä superrikkaiden ja loistokkaiden ihmisten kanssa. Ja varmaan en kenenkään lukukokemusta pilaa, jos kerron, että loppu hyvin, kaikki hyvin (paitsi sille kostettavalle :))
Absolutely loved this book! At first it seemed a little bit slow, but by the 150th page I was so into it! This book has amazing and believable storyline! Sorry it is over, as it will be hard to find something similar!
I got a trade paperback from the publishers to review and I really enjoyed this. It's a beach read in the tradition of Jilly Cooper, lots of sex, sun and glamour!
A sexy thrilling read set in the high-octane world of big business, Hollywood and high-class call girls. The 3 main characters are very appealing and this is an entertaining glamourous read!
International action book focusing on the lives of three women with one man in common. I would describe this as a women's action book. Entertaining, provoking, but not really spectacular.