Belle De Jour by Anonymous

Belle De Jour: Diary of an Unlikely Call Girl By Anonymous
ISBN: 9780446577250
Pages: 291
Synopsis from BN.com :

Belle couldn't find a job after University. Her impressive degree was not paying her rent or buying her food. But after a fantastic threesome with a very rich couple that gave her a ton of money, Belle realized that she could earn more than anyone she knew--by becoming a call girl. The rest is history. Belle became a twenty-something London working girl--and had the audacity to write about it--anonymously. The shockingly candid and explicit diary she put on the Internet became a London sensation. Now, in BELLE DE JOUR, she shares her entire journey inside the world of high-priced escorts, including fascinating and explicit insights about her job and her clients, her various boyfriends, and a taboo lifestyle that has to be read to be believed. The witty observations, shocking revelations, and hilarious scenarios deliver like the very best fiction and makes for a titillating reading experience unlike any other.

My Rating: A

My Review:

I bought this book without having heard of the t.v. show, and then waited a couple of years to actually sit down and read it. By the time I read the book, I had watched a few episodes of the show, but didn't take to it from the choppy way that it was set up. Now that I've read the book, I understand.

When I started the book, I didn't exactly expect the book to be set up like a diary. Don't ask me why, I just assumed that was a fun name for the book.

The book was great, it was written, as said, like an actual diary, with the dates in French. The secondary characters (which as always are important to me) were interesting, and had their own stories that I was pulled into. Even though Belle is in a profession society doesn't think of as something to be proud of, she takes pride in her work. Her clients are a source of entertainment, and their sexcapades are sometimes hum drum, but often shocking. I don't think that any of the book was written for pure shock value though, it seemed quite genuine.

A couple things were a little bothersome, but I quickly got over them. For one, four of Belle's friends are reoccurring in the story. A1, A2, A3, and A4. The first few 'months' I spent a little time trying to figure out which was which.

The second thing that bugged me was that there were times when she would write about something that I thought would be a big part of the plot, and then I never read anything about it the rest of the book. I figured out after talking to someone about the book though, that this often happens when you're writing in a diary. You think that something is going to be major in your life, and then it turns out to be something, even months down the road, that you don't even remember!

I recommend this book, but not to someone who is...vanilla, as we sometimes say. The sex scenes, of which there are plenty, but not overmuch, can get quite graphic. This book though, is really about a young woman, trying to figure out her life a little bit.