Author: Lola Smirnova
Genre: New Adult
Publication Date: January 26, 2014
Purchase from Amazon: ebook || paperback
Synopsis from Goodreads:
In
the corrupt economy of post-Soviet Ukraine opportunities are scarce. Young and
eager sisters – Natalia, Lena and Julia – harbor dreams of a better life. Naïve
and tempted by the allure of ‘quick’ money, the girls set off on an adventure
that changes their lives forever.
Can
they stay out of trouble enough to fulfill their ambitions? Can they hold on to
their idealism in a world where depravity and danger are constant companions?
How far are they willing to go to make a buck?
Twisted is a disturbing behind-the-scenes look at a world that most will never see. It is shocking, raw, and explicit.
Twisted is a disturbing behind-the-scenes look at a world that most will never see. It is shocking, raw, and explicit.
Praises
“Twisted tells the story of a young Ukrainian girl
named Julia, whose family is struck with poverty after the fall of the Soviet
Union. Her two older sisters leave home and become sex workers, glossing
over the more distasteful aspects of their occupation, planting the seeds of
both curiosity and greed in young Julia. She eventually finds the
lure of easy money too beguiling and begins her journey into the darker aspects
of drug abuse, drunken stupors, and the horrid and loveless life of a
sex-for-sale prostitute... Twisted is an amazing book that is well written and
provocative. This book is a worthwhile read.” - Michael Alexander’s BDSM Review
“The characters are real, dialog
intoxicating, and the plot well crafted.” – Reviewed by Gary
Stout at Readers’ Favorite
Excerpt from Chapter 2
My name is Julia. I am from Ukraine. I work as an
entertainer in one of the many cabarets in Luxembourg City. In other words … I
am a prostitute.
Luxembourg City is the capital of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, the
pint-sized, landlocked country in the heart of Western Europe. By Shanghai,
London or New York’s standards, it wouldn’t be strange to have sixty champagne
bars in one city, but it does sound quirky when you consider that Luxembourg
City is twice as small as Orlando Disney World.
This sleepy and conservative locale, the world’s eighth-largest banking
and financial centre, motherland of prioress Yolanda and the 100-watt radio
transmitter, is stuffed with sex-orientated ‘establishments’, like the one
where I work. What’s more, they are jam-packed with
able-to-eat-a-horse-for-the-dough girls from different countries – mostly, of
course, Eastern Europeans, who would do anything to make an extra buck.
Champagne bar, whorehouse, brothel, house of assignation, bordello, den
of vice; call them what you like, it does not change the core of these places.
Although they are often called cabarets, and occasionally there is even
strip-dancing involved, you shouldn’t associate them with merrymaking or
extravaganza. ‘Trade’, ‘sex’, ‘transactions’, ‘carnal’, ‘barter’ or
‘perversion’ would be the better words to portray this type of nightery.
This is a place where one man can spend thousands of euro in an hour or
sip only Coke all night long; where the currency is not money but champagne;
where often nobody is really interested in the champagne’s quality or taste,
but rather finds its value in the size and quantity of the bottles; where the
sanctity of the sparkling drink of the gods and the missionary position are
lost in the blue confusion of fake orgasms and sex noises.
It works as simply as a jukebox – to get music, you have to stick in a
coin. If you want a girl to lavish attention on you, pay for her champagne.
The cheapest option is a €25 glass of bubbly, which gives you 15 minutes
of an affectionate and solicitous bond with a girl at the bar. Pay twice that
price and your ‘date’ drinks piccolo, the 250 ml
bottle. In this case, the time you spend with her is doubled, but the storyline
stays the same. Next: the demi-bouteille, a 375 ml
bottle that costs about €180 for half an hour. This ‘denomination’ grants a
little bit of comfort, because both of you can move to a dim semi-private
lounge, as well as the confidence that physical manipulation will be involved.
And last, but not least, is the ‘full house’ for the standard bottle, the price
for which varies. It kicks off at €250 for questionable swill, which is
reasonable damage considering that in addition to a drink, you get screwed for
an hour in the séparé – a private
room, most commonly upstairs. You could be asked to pay up to €650 for Cristal
or Dom Perignon, where, of course, you cough up not only for sex but also for
the champagne’s snobbish name, fine finish in the mouth, and the supplementary
fondness and devotion. Sad to say, these pricey bottles – and the
one-and-a-half litre magnums that go for €1,000 or more – are a rare occurrence
in these clubs.
The uniqueness of such places is that while you, the customer, are
having leisure time with your ‘pick’, her mind is constantly dividing the
amount that you’ve already spent by five (this is how much commission the house
pays her), adding her €60 daily salary and planning how to badger you to buy another
bottle, all that while smiling or laughing hard enough to make sure that all of
these calculations in her head are not reflected on her pretty face.
Most of the clubs open at one in the afternoon and cease their trading
at about four in the morning. Of course, the run has to be split – there are
day and night shifts. Even though, practically, there is no big difference
between the two spells, the contrast in the clientele is huge.
The day shift – fuck, I
hate it! – is all about the married and the perverts, but more
often the married perverts. As a rule, they drop by to use their lunch break
for a dull, uncomplicated quickie, or for depraved ‘activities’ they have never
had the guts to share with their wives and girlfriends. They don’t drink much and
have limited time. That is why the club is usually boring and full of freaks,
but in the end, who cares if you can get the bottle?
On the other hand, the night transforms the club and fills it with a
party flavour – the music is louder, the customers are drunker and the laughter
gets more sincere. Even the girls’ sweat looks like a piece of cake. The
problem is that the boys often get carried away by the alcohol and the
thundering crowd, so their brains switch out of sex mode. If there is no sex,
there is probably going to be no bottle either.
But enough, I don’t want to bore you. Let’s set in motion my adventure
that, by the way, began without me.
About the Author
Lola Smirnova is an
author from Ukraine, who for many years worked in the sex industry. She
recently released her debut novel Twisted. Twisted is a work of fiction, but it
is inspired by the author’s real life experiences making a living in the
sex trade.
Lola Smirnova is currently working on her second novel Crave – a sequel
to Twisted. To learn more, go to http://lolasmirnova.com/.
Connect with Lola
on:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/BookTwisted
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