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Judith Krantz (1928–2019)

Autor(a) de Scruples

23+ Works 5,485 Membros 63 Críticas 3 Favorited

About the Author

Judith Krantz was born on January 9, 1929 in New York City. She graduated from Wellesley College in 1948. She was a fashion publicist in Paris in the late 1940s. She was the fashion editor for Good Housekeeping magazine, a contributing writer to McCall's magazine and Ladies' Home Journal, and the mostrar mais contributing West Coast editor of Cosmopolitan. Her first novel, Scruples, was published in 1978. Her other novels include Princess Daisy, Mistral's Daughter, I'll Take Manhattan, Till We Meet Again, The Jewels of Tessa Kent, and Lovers. Her autobiography, Sex and Shopping: The Confessions of a Nice Jewish Girl, was published in 2000. Although she did not publish her first book until she was 50, Krantz's 10 novels have together sold more than 85 million copies in more than 50 languages. Most of her books also became TV movies or mini-series, often produced by her husband, Steve Krantz. Because of her love for reading and writing, Krantz was an enthusiastic supporter of the Library Foundation of Los Angeles and an active member of the Council of the Library Foundation. In 2014, she received the Light of Learning Award from the LFLA. In recognition of her many years of support, the Los Angeles Public Library named the Judith Krantz Fiction Collection in her honor. Judith Krantz passed away on 06/22/2019 at the age of 91. (Bowker Author Biography) mostrar menos
Image credit: Judith Krantz 2010 - Photo: Famous

Séries

Obras por Judith Krantz

Scruples (1978) 821 exemplares
Princess Daisy (1980) 772 exemplares
Mistral's Daughter (1982) 626 exemplares
I'll Take Manhattan (1986) 604 exemplares
Till We Meet Again (1988) 532 exemplares
Scruples Two (1992) 496 exemplares
Dazzle (1990) 466 exemplares
Lovers (1994) 387 exemplares
The Jewels of Tessa Kent (1998) 374 exemplares
Spring Collection (1996) 354 exemplares
Mistrals Dotter 2 exemplares
Haute collection (1996) 2 exemplares

Associated Works

Mistral's Daughter [1984 TV mini series] (1984) — Original book — 8 exemplares
Princess Daisy [1983 TV movie] (1983) — Original novel — 4 exemplares
Scruples [1980 TV mini series] (1992) — Original book — 3 exemplares
Till We Meet Again [1989 TV mini series] — Original book — 1 exemplar

Etiquetado

Conhecimento Comum

Membros

Críticas


Gorgeous, flamboyant Maxi Amberville is twenty-nine and has already discarded three husbands on two continents. Life is a stream of endless pleasure in her lavish Trump Tower apartment--until her widowed mother married a man who plots to sell her father's magazine empire. And Maxi turns her incredible lust for living into a passionate quest for power.

Maxi takes over the small weekly Buttons And Bows. She gathers her hot-blooded ex-husband, sassy daughter and a coterie of the powerful elite. Then, risking all, Maxi creates B&B --the glitziest, ritziest, most successful fashion magazine in the country. Here is a dramatic, sizzling story of love, family, ambition and one unforgettable woman who gives life and love everything she has


Maxi Amberville, another sensational heroine in another TV-miniseries-to-be-novel. Beautiful, thrice-married Maxi is independently wealthy, and flamboyantly carefree until she locks horns with her vile uncle over a matter of family honor. He would close down several unprofitable magazines in her late father's publishing empire, but she insists on trying to rescue the sentimental underdog. Her transformation scheme is a delight. Power struggles, steamy sex, high finance, and scandal in the Big Apple provide a fascinating cast of characters with a fast-paced story line that will keep readers turning pages late into the night

Lots of money, energy, sex and business politics in the magazine world. The denouement comes a bit quick at the end, but the story doesnt suffer too much because of it
… (mais)
 
Assinalado
nordie | 4 outras críticas | Oct 14, 2023 |
The tale of a mother-daughter relationship gone desperately wrong, and of love and loss, set against the glamorous backdrop of the international auction houses. [return][return] Standard decent (for) Krantz fare, with mega rich selfish people, falling outs between mothers and daughters and the final realisation (due to a "life altering crises") that family means more than most
 
Assinalado
nordie | 4 outras críticas | Oct 14, 2023 |
I forget how much we have changed as a society in what is considered acceptable and what isn't.

This book takes place from the mid-70's to the early 80's when certain things were considered normal and other things have yet to even happen
.
An example: Women who are pregnant drink alcohol. Yup. In this book and the previous one in this duet, two of the characters are pregnant (at different times). One (in the previous book) is going to have her kid in the next 24 hours (although she thinks it will be two weeks away). She thinks that alcohol that is made from fruit or is fruit flavored can't hurt the baby, because fruit is good for people, RIGHT? Although she is kind of ditzy in the book, she isn't stupid. Anyhow she talks the guy she is with into getting booze to drink because they are stressing out over being nominated for the Academy Awards (She's in it for best supporting actress and the awards are the next day). Anyhow, her guy gets like 10 different types of fruit flavored liquors including Framboise. She likes that it has practically no flavor but it smells nice. She and her guy get totally bombed. In that book there is nothing wrong with that. There is no internal monolog saying "maybe I shouldn't". Nope, they get bombed and there are no repercussions. It happens again in this book at the beginning when the main heroine finds out she is unplanned and unexpectedly pregnant by her new husband. She finds out because her Oscar dress was too tight. Her husband is up for best Picture (he was the producer). She is pissed and goes home and has a couple of brandies. Then the next day (in the beginning of this book) she had multiple glasses of champagne. Although she loses the baby early on, there is never any talk that it could have been from drinking

That and the casual infidelity as well as the general tone of the early 80's with its mass capitalism.

I did find it funny how towards the end of the book two of the main characters think that they could go into the catalog business to sell their big idea of vintage lingerie. However, they don’t' think it would be a good idea because what catalog only sells lingerie? Victoria's Secret hadn't been started yet. Also, in case you are too young to remember, Victoria's Secret was strictly a catalog store with more clothes, shoes and accessories than lingerie when it first came out in the early 90's. Actually, they didn't even have lingerie then (I don't think). It was a straight clothing catalog.

Another thing that made this book dated was the complete lack of technology that is abundant today. No computers, no cell phones, no phones that weren't actually attached to the wall (so no cordless phones). The plot depended a lot on that fact. People weren't as accessible; news wasn't so fast to get around.

Anyhow, I love this book, I read it for the first time in 1998 when I was stuck in my own version of quarantine at an in-law’s home in Jordan. No tv, nothing to do but read her books. She had a large library with all the Judith Krantz, Sydney Sheldon, Harold Robbins, and other books. It was there that I read my first "erotica".
… (mais)
 
Assinalado
Library_Breeder | 4 outras críticas | Apr 28, 2023 |
I love this book! I don't care how many times I read it, and the fact that it was published in the 80's and takes place in the 70's, or that it isn't intellectual. It's a great story. I recommend it to any woman who is looking for a book to break her slump without thinking too hard. Judith Krantz is a great author for books that read easily and require little to no really depth of thinking. Sounds kind of mean to say that, but it's true. Kind of like the Sydney Sheldon of Chick Lit.

Anyhow, I have always read this in paperback form. I would get the book from the local used bookshop. However, this time I read the Kindle version from Amazon. I have to say that I was really disappointed in the editing of it. There were many typos that I suspect were made because the person translating the book from print to e-book misread the words. I know that the paperback font can sometimes cause words like "club" to look like "dub" so this might account for some of the weird words that made no sense. Also, there were many times where a page break should have been made but wasn't. A major cut-scene wasn't made and I found myself wondering what was going on for a second. Also, some words were italicized for emphasis (not that the word was foreign) that made no sense. A sentence would have some random word in italics. If you can get past those editing problems which were littered throughout the book, the story outshines the book.

Now, a bit of a warning. This book was written in the very early 80's and its main story takes place in the mid to late 70's. So, if you aren't familiar with the times you will find yourself not quite understanding why the characters act the way they do. Why they allow certain events to happen.
The ideas of workplace harassment, sexual harassment, PC language and ethnic stereotypes being unacceptable haven’t made their appearance in American culture yet. So, be prepared for Asians to be labeled as Orientals, and workplace harassment, mansplaining, the treatment of women in general to be kind of behind the times. Hell, even I was kind of shocked to read about a 28 year old woman seducing a 14 year old boy. It wasn't at all considered wrong or shocking. She was just being the young cougar teaching a the son of a friend how to please a woman. This woman who knew the son and conversed with him since he was a young boy. Whom she watched grow into the adolescent knowing all the time she planned to have him.

Also, the pop culture of the time heavily plays into the story. It is full of refereces to celebrities of the day, famous events and places. Advertising and marketing of the times is a major part of the story. If you are under 30 and haven't watched any commercials or tv shows from that time (70s') you might not quite get the overall tone of the book.

Also, keep an app to calculate the dollars from the time period into the current dollars or else you won't understand the money. Many times monetary amounts are given in relation to living expenses, salary, or prices and since it's low you might not understand how a woman could live on $175 a week in New York while also supporting someone else.

I am not going to get into the plot of the story except to say that it is about Daisy Valensky who is the daughter of Stash and Veronica Valensky. Stash Valenski is the direct descendant to some Russian royalty and Veronica is a major movie star of the 50's when they meet.

About the story, it follows the standard Judith Krantz pattern of a quick bite of "current" and then delves into the character's past. In this case it delves into the main character Daisy's parents and grandparents past and brings the story up to the "present". It sounds like it would be overly long and boring, but it isn't. That's the secret about Judith Krantz books, they take a long time to get to the present, but the story getting there speeds by and is totally engrossing. This book shows us the best of love, loyalty, family, and life-long friendships with other women who only need to grab a shovel to help you hide a body.

The story goes into Stash's past from childhood. It might seem like that is kind of overkill, but it is important to understand current events in the book. Anyhow, Stash and Veronica have Daisy who is the heroine and main protagonist of the book. We follow her life. She is a great heroine, not TSTL, manages to have a brain and behaves in the way most women would.

Along with Daisy, there are other characters who are both major and minor in the book. They all have a place in her life and some, more than others are given time. Daisy basically pulls herself up by her bootstraps and manages to make a life for herself when she is forced to take on burdens that she never had in the past. The book isn't a romance, but it has a few romances in it. We don't have a "hero" per se until later, and the sex scenes are pretty tame, but don't let that keep you from reading it. It's one of those books that really don't need explicit sex to be enjoyable.
… (mais)
 
Assinalado
Library_Breeder | 14 outras críticas | Apr 28, 2023 |

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Estatísticas

Obras
23
Also by
5
Membros
5,485
Popularidade
#4,542
Avaliação
½ 3.4
Críticas
63
ISBN
435
Línguas
20
Marcado como favorito
3

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