Intimate: A Novel [Paperback]

Elizabeth Gage (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 1998

From the bestselling author "A Glimpse of Stocking" and "Confession" comes the intriguing story of three extraordinary people whose secrets, sins, and shameless hungers lead them to the farthest outposts of lust.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Gage's (A Glimpse of Stocking) new novel is a hyperactive rags-to-riches story of three people caught in a web of ambition, passion, deceit and revenge. Having escaped a childhood of poverty to become the head of a business empire and the richest man in America, Jordan Lazarus has everything money can buy?which doesn't include love. Leslie Chamberlain overcomes her provincial, small-town roots through education and becomes a top-flight advertising executive until her career is cut short?by love. Jill Flemming, who has run away from a nightmarish childhood, determined to become someone?anyone?else, is a master chameleon who ruthlessly seduces both men and women in her pathological quest?for love. Destiny and panting prose bring these three characters together in a complex triangle that will eventually kill one of them. The book is so overplotted and saturated with characters that, by the time Gage finally gets the principals together, readers are likely to be exhausted.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Gage (Taboo, LJ 3/15/93) spins a tale of romance, obsession, betrayal, and revenge. Spanning five decades, the story follows the lives of three people who are gradually drawn together by fate. They remain unaware of just how much their lives have become entangled until events take an explosive, tragic turn. Gage's characters have potential but for the most part remain superficially drawn. For instance, Jordan, who is described as the richest man in America, is unrealistically naive and trusting. Although his mantra is "never trust a woman," he allows himself to become a pawn of two manipulative and destructive women. The book is entertaining despite these flaws, however, and should be popular with readers who enjoy the travails of the rich and famous.
--Barbara E. Kemp, Albany Univ. Lib., N.Y.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 627 pages
• Publisher: Pocket Books (Mm) (June 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0671891847
• ISBN-13: 978-0671891848
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4.2 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,039,662 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A sensuous, fast-paced, powerful story that is very gripping, October 8, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Intimate: A Novel (Paperback)

If you are not already an Elizabeth Gage devotee, you are in for one special treat. Ms.Gage possesses a rare gift for words, an unique talent for vibrant phrasing that carries the plot along and develops an intimate view of her characters. Her writing has always been extremely erotic and quite graphic, but without being offensive. Her current novel, INTIMATE, is no exception. It chronicles the intricately-weaved relationships between a man and two women, tormented souls with secrets in their pasts. Gage, with her uncanny ability to bring alive raw emotion on the printed page, transports you to to the presence of company who find that love can be the cruelest of weapons. Utterly compelling and absolutely rivetting. Bravo!

1 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Underground, July 24, 2010

By 

Doreen Appleton (Scottsdale, Arizona) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Intimate: A Novel (Paperback)

Simon & Schuster did not want Elizabeth Gage. Joni Evans, then the wife of Dick Snyder (who later ran Little Golden Books into the ground, as was reported by Publishers Weekly many times), rejected the book on behalf of S&S. Bill Grose, the head of Pocket Books, somehow got around her, and S&S exercised its topping privilege to win Jay Garon's auction and acquire A GLIMPSE OF STOCKING for $511,500. Garon's contract was a good one: the author retained all rights except North American. With foreign sales, the earnings reached $1.4 million.

S&S didn't want Gage because they had Jackie Collins, that great talent, and Judith Michael, the nerdy husband-and-wife writing team. They were also offended that this first novelist from Glenview, Illinois, had so much more talent than their own authors.

At a lunch at the Four Seasons Restaurant, Michael Korda and his then special friend Trish Lande tried to get Gage and her husband to change to a writing husband-and-wife team like Judith Michael. Gage and her husband refused. S&S walked out of the Four Seasons while the author was in the ladies' room.
Later Korda tried to get Gage to take a lower royalty than the one specified in the contract. Gage refused.After six weeks of pressure. S&S caved.

The editing, by a faceless group of editors, was finished, the book was ready to go to press, when Korda turned the script over to Lande, saying "See if you can find anything wrong with this."

Lande covered the manuscript with coffee stains and cut out chapters which were crucial to the momentum of the book. In a long-distance conference call to Gage in Hawaii, Korda told her, "You have to make Trish's changes. You have to understand why it is so important that you surrender to us."

Gage lectured Korda and Lande over the phone about Chapter 4 of The Great Gatsby, which which Fitzgerald stops the action to simply give the names of the people who visited West Egg that summer. "My chapters are far more important to the movement of the story than Fitzgerald's Chapter 4."

Chastened, furious, Korda said "I guess Trish and I should read those chapters again." In the end the chapters stayed. The book became a New York Times bestseller, But S&S did not forgive. They withdrew Gage's second novel, Pandora's Box, from the stores after one week "for lack of interest."

Jay Garon, furious, moved Gage to Pocket Books, where she received big advances but zero promotion.

As a result, Gage never became a brand name novelist, but her five novels for S&S/Pocket and her two books for Mira remain cult classics with avid fans around the world. Her unique combination of violence, sex, and psychological depth set her far above the Krantzes and Collinses and Bradfords of the writing world.