High Stakes is about the lives of five women who are harassed, harangued, and harried. They all work in the publishing I distort which is fast paced and driven. Three have families and find it increasingly difficult to juggle kids, job, and life. This was a fast read for me. It was very much the DS tempo and her writing had gusto.
I didn’t like Allie or Francine very much. I thought Francine was very passive and should have been more proactive sooner.
I liked Hailey the best. It was fun to read behind the scenes in the publishing industry.
I liked how all,the stories were wrapped up, tidy and neat.

High Stakes is the story of five women in the literary and talent agent business. A touching story that involves the Me Too crisis.
There are a lot of characters and their lives to get to know. I had a hard time keeping them straight for a while. I enjoyed the story and how it all played out.
I liked the characters and their back stories. This was the most interesting part.
The ending was just a little too perfect for me. But you know what? Sometimes we all need an ending to be perfect..

Thanks to netgalley and Random House Publishing Group-Ballantine for the advance copy

A great Danielle Steel novel set in New York in the aftermath of the #METOO era. Set in an agency that handles both literature and actors, the lead female characters are portrayed as strong and fierce. Dan, one of the agency owners, is a chauvinist, misogynistic pig who thinks he can get away with what ever he wants sexually with the women of his agency. He has been having relations for the past ten years with Francine, another agent at the agency, holding her job over her head. When he tries to rape new literary agent Jane, shit hits the fan. She does not stand for Dan's behavior and goes to the police and Dan is arrested. They find out about his inappropriate relation with Francine, as well as what he had threatened Jane and Francine.

Each agent has her own story, and the characters are woven together seamlessly. I found myself cheering for each of the heroines, hoping that they all get their own happy ever afters.

Danielle Steel gives us a look at the high stakes of being a career-oriented woman in an abusive workplace. The book centers around five women and how they handle their career, family life, and work relationships.

This book was different from most of her books that I read, but I enjoyed it very much and highly recommend it. You will not want to put it down until you have read how each woman has handled the different situations in her life.

I received a copy of the book from NetGalley and Random House/Ballentine publishers. The opinions expressed are my own.

I loved reading this book. This is an author I never hesitate to pick up and read. This is one of my favorites by her yet. I enjoy this author's writing skills that make her stories entertaining and just written with alot of heart. The characters pulled me into the story from the start. This is a well written story about five women who are playing high stakes when it comes to their lives. They are creative and unique characters that bring the story to life. They are connectable and kept me coming back for more. I wanted to know what would happen next. They had great growth throughout the story. This is a fast paced, engaging story that was hard to put down. I enjoyed how well rounded this story is and had great world building. I really enjoyed what the characters brought to the story and the emotional ride they took me on. This is a must read story that I highly recommend. A must read story by an author you don't want to miss.

High stakes is about five ladies that work for a talent agency and is based around the MeToo movement. Although this topic is a hard issue , the story does it in a way to keep a relevant topic interesting . Five women work for the agency and all have different responses to how they are treated and they all have very different lifestyles.
Danielle Steel does a great job with such a serious topic. Thank you Netgalley and publisher for an arc for my honest opinion .

High Stakes by Danielle Steel is another one of her wonderful stand-alone novels. Jane Addison has just graduated and dreams of one day owning her own publishing company; she takes an entry level job at Fletcher and Benson, a well-known literary and entertainment agency. She is assigned to be an assistant to Hailey West, one of the best agents in the Literary department. To Jane’s dismay, she immediately encounters, Dan Fletcher, one of the co-founders of the agency, as he makes lewd remarks about her; she recognizes that he is a predator. Jane will avoid him as much as possible, even though he continues to make sexual attempts on her, and she threatens to report him. Jane discovers that most of the women try to stay clear of Fletcher, and despite their disgrace, no one reports him, as they fear for their jobs.

We also meet the other wonderful women of the company. Hailey is at the top of her career, being a successful literary agent. She is widowed, and has three children, and constantly struggles to keep up with her job, as well as take care of her children.

Francine Rivers is in charge of the literary department, and she is divorced with two children. Even though she has a good paying job, Francine also struggles with both work and home. We learn quickly that Fletcher over a number of years, has forced Francine to have sex with him twice a week, stressing if she doesn’t, he will have her fired.

Allie Moore, is in charge of the entertainment department, dealing with actors and actresses; she loves her job, always dining out with many of them. When she falls in love with one of the younger actors, she is warned it could hurt her reputation, as she is older than him. Allie refuses to stop seeing Eric, but becomes concerned that her reputation could be tarnished.

Merriweather Jones, is the CFO of the company, and is very well liked by everyone. Her marriage is on the rocks, as her husband stays home and takes care of their daughter. She loves her job, and dreads going home, as her husband is always belligerent.

When Fletcher accosts Jane again, pushing her against the wall, she goes to a lawyer to claim sexual harassment. Fletcher is charged, and tries to buy her off, which she refuses. In a short time, a few others in the company will also add their voices to the sexual harassment fight.
What follows is a wonderful story of five very talented woman who supported each other, especially in this ‘me too movement’. For most of the women, they all have their own issues, not necessarily the sexual harassment, but struggling with family and financially, marriages falling apart, love, respect, and threats against them.

High Stakes was a fabulous story focusing on not only social issues in life, as well as in the job. I have been very impressed with Danielle Steel’s more recent books which are not only interesting, but willing to cover various issues. High Stakes was very well written by Steel, as she gives us a glimpse of hidden things women may face in the workplace. Very well done.

4 1/2 STARS!

Dramatic and addictive! Danielle Steel is a dynamo at digging into the heart of a character's surroundings and taking her reader deep into the foundation of every story she unravels. HIGH STAKES delivers just the right amount of flair to catch the reader's attention while sinking us into the hearts of several characters and their combined stories. The start was a little slow until I got all of the characters down pat and then the pace picked up as one character after another revealed their secrets and turmoil. I was hooked from start to finish!

I highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys a story filled with emotional depth, situational drama and characters you find yourself rooting for throughout their story.

High Stakes by Danielle Steel. I have read Danielle Steel for years. I love opening the pages of her stories and discovering Danielle Steel new books. Danielle Steel did a wonderful portrayal of abuse in the workplace and the ramifications of it while throwing in some romance.

High Stakes, by Danielle Steel, did not disappoint. It is a powerful Me Too Movement story of career-driven women and the abuse they endure in the workplace in order to keep their jobs... until one woman finally took a stand. Thanks, NetGalley and the publisher for an ARC ebook in exchange for my honest review.

This was my first Danielle steel book ever. I’ve had The Butler on my TBR for forever and just have never gotten around to it. My father in law raves about this author, so I was intrigued to read one of her books.

High stakes follows Jane on her journey as she starts a new job at a small NYC literary and talent agency. Throughout the book the 4 women she works with are being introduced more and more, and on top of each of their own struggles, dark secrets come to light. Because Jane is the youngest (with probably the least to lose), she is the first one to try and make a change at the firm.

Holy smokes. I was not prepared for the me too aspect in this book. I also am very surprised by how much I actually liked this. When I realized how many books Danielle steel has published and how long she’s been writing, I thought her work was mostly “not for my generation” (I know, what an incredibly vain way to judge a book). But this was great !!

I loved the writing. To be honest there were a lot of characters in this book and it took me a while to get a hang of who’s who, but the intricate office dynamic and getting to know everyone’s quirks was fantastic. I went through a myriad of emotions at various stages in the book, but I loved it overall. Danielle Steel is for sure an author I’m going to revisit very soon!

Not my favorite Danielle Steel book, but good for her for taking an approach at the Me Too Movement.

High Stakes is another hit by Danielle Steel! High Stakes follows five career driven women with a focus on sexual harassment in the workplace. Very powerful story about having the strength to stand up and do the right thing. Excellent read! Thanks to NetGalley for the opportunity to read. #HighStakes #NetGalley

So, I think Danielle Steel is AI. Of course I know she is an actual person, but I’m still not convinced she isn’t using artificial intelligence to write her books. This was my first time reading Steel. I recently read an article about how she has written over 90 books and I was intrigued having never read anything by her. I thought she came off a little old school in her article. She was all about being extremely dedicated to work and spoke of how she basically chains herself to her desk so she can write. It didn’t sound like the work life balance dream that myself and other millennials strive for. Nonetheless, when I had the opportunity to read an advanced copy of *one* of her newest books, I was too curious not to take it.

High Stakes is about five successful women at a literary and talent agency and the different lives they lead. In fact, this book is all about the balance of work and personal life and how it weighs differently for everyone, although all of these women place their careers very high on their priorities list. I liked hearing more about the behind the scenes of the literary world from someone who knows it well.

The reason I think Steel’s books are actually written by robots is because the tone was very mechanical and the content would be repeated over and over. I know there were a lot of characters to follow but give the reader some credit, I can remember what happened five pages ago and don’t need it spelled out for me again and again. There was barely any emotion conveyed from our omniscient narrator and it was hard to fully connect to the characters. Yet, the story did move along nicely. It was basically what I would imagine from someone who treats writing stories as their disciplined day job.

Another thing that bothered me was how disgusting one of the male characters was. It just felt lazy. Rather than build a character with dimension, Steel just created the most outrageous person she could. It was blatantly ridiculous and just felt unbelievable. I’m not trying to be ignorant about the bad people in the world, but really these situations were just not realistic. I feel like it was one thing too many to pack into this story.

Overall, I see why Steel is a bestselling author. Although this book was nothing special to me, it was still enough to keep me wondering about it. Her writing is clear and concise; I always appreciate a story that is easy to follow. While I found the variety of characters and storylines interesting, there was nothing about this that seemed next level.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine for an ARC of this book.

Danielle Steel never disappoints. High Stakes is about 5 woman with careers trying to juggle them with relationships some married and some not. This is a perfect example of the amazing story telling talent Danielle Steel has. She weaves between the characters with enough details that you remember them all as you read and that is hard to do. It was a page turner that I simply did not want to put down. Such an amazing way to show how doing the right thing can change so many people's lives! What a wonderful way to spend reading by being caught up in this lovely novel. Thanks to Net Galley for the chance to read this amazing ARC.

Fletcher and Benson has always been THE talent agency and with that comes issues. Jane is the newest employee and she's not going to push things down the way others have. But what about the other women who work there? Four of them tell their stories here and each has their own personal challenge, be it childcare, relationship issues, or financial struggles. They are broadly drawn but recognizable. Harassment on the job looks large but don't expect this to get too graphic or deep- that's not Steel's style. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. For Steel fans.

Set during the Me Too! movement, this book revolves around 5 women, their careers at a literary agency, and their lives outside work. The multiple story-lines did make it a bit difficult to keep up with each character, and to get deeply invested in their stories as individuals.

It was a quick read focused on a difficult subject, but was handled with poise and confidence by the author. It is a shame that women were, and continue to be, treated this way, but my hope is that sometime in the future it will all be history. Books like this will continue to shine the light on Me Too!

Thanks to the author, publisher and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book, but my opinions are my own.

Overall, I really liked this book. Solid 3 stars, with a caveat.

This book is about sexual harassment. The synopsis seems to want to dance around that and not give away any secrets, but that's the heart of the story and I don't consider that to be a spoiler. It's a standard Danielle Steel, so anyone familiar with her books will recognize her style and writing. Really enjoyed the characters, even the ones that weren't all that likeable. The main characters are all strong, ambitious, hard-working females. They each have their issues and challenges, some more dramatic than others. The storyline gets a bit cliché at times, and there are some cheesy parts where I had to roll my eyes, but honestly, I've come to expect that with Danielle Steel books, and I'm okay with that. I'm a big fan of them, maybe because of the cliché and cheesy. While the subject matter is a genuinely serious issue, I felt the harassment that occurred here to be WAY over the top. I'm sure there are people who will blast me for that and say I have no idea what I'm talking about, it really is that blatant, and that's okay. From this reader's standpoint, the book would have been far more palatable if the author had practiced some subtlety.

I have a broader complaint that goes beyond this book. I find it annoying that books (including this one) seem to so easily jump on the latest bandwagon du jour. It got annoying how many times the phrase "me too" or #metoo was used in this book. Sexual harassment has been around a LONG time, but suddenly its fashionable to write about it. Six months from now, I'm sure there will be a Danielle Steel book on Covid, and then six months after that, one on racism and black lives matter. And I will read them, I'm sure, because I like her books. But I'll complain about those too, because a story about the latest cause or movement just seems so unimaginative. Write about something I haven't seen over and over again on the news. Or, better yet, write about a subject BEFORE it becomes news. That, for me, is a good book.

Having won writing awards and taking creative writing classes, myself, I can recognize and appreciate it. Danielle Steel tells it like it is with no fancy frills or fluff. It's so much easier to read and, for me, makes me more eager to pick up my Kindle and continue the story. "High Stakes" was no exception. There was no great plot (maybe no overall "plot" at all), just the tale of five different women pursuing their vocational aspirations.. But it was very interesting getting to know each of them, their differences and their similarities.

While I often remove a star from my rating for language and sex, all 5 stars remain for this one.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/4571810600?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Review will be posted elsewhere (like Amazon) after publication.

High Stakes by Danielle Steel is yet another masterpiece in the collection of her writing. This is a powerful book focused around sexual harassment and the "Me Too" movement. It follows several women working together in the same work place. Lots of characters so follow closely. Also, there are some topics which may be triggers for some including rape and sexual assault. I recommend this read not only for the author but what she has to say to bring women's voices further.