Review-Diamond Playgirls

Diamond Playgirls by Daaimah S. Poole

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


That is a generous 3 stars. This book was just okay.

It is a series of 4 novellas written by 4 different female authors, each about a woman who is moving into a brownstone in New York City.

The first story is about Dior, who comes from Montreal, Canada. I wasn't a huge fan of her story at first, but after reading the others, hers actually wasn't too bad. Dior is a shopaholic and spends too much money (she even runs out of cash on her first day in NYC and can't pay her cab fare). She starts a Myspace account and begins chatting with this guy named Mr. GoodBlackMan, who is really sweet and sounds like his name: a good black man. However, Dior also meets another guy (can't remember his name at the moment) and he also seems too good to be true (and proves it.) Like I said, Dior's story wasn't too bad, although it was super predictable (at least to me) who Mr. GoodBlackMan would turn out to be.

The next story is Tamara's, which was written by Daaimah S. Poole. Ms. Poole is the only author of this bunch that I had ever heard of. I've read most of her books and really liked them, so I figured her story would be my favorite. That was not the case. Tamara's story was so boring, I can't even remember what it was about. Something where she's a party promoter and she's hired to plan the opening of a new club. All the while, her married boss starts hitting on her. The blurb on the back of the book mentioned something about her dating 3 men at once, but that never happened.

Next up is Chloe. I actually liked Chloe and her story the most of all, as hers seemed the most realistic. Chloe's father is a famous businessman so in her old town, she's somewhat of a celebrity, so she moves to NYC to try and make it on her own. She gets a job as an assistant at a magazine. She's good at what she does and even gets mentioned for a promotion, although she hates the woman she works for. She meets Chris, a man she falls in love with, but it turns out he has had some unpleasant dealings with her father, so Chloe hides the fact that she is the man's daughter.

Lastly is Mona Lisa, who's story is only slightly more interesting than Tamara's, but she's more unlikeable than Tamara. Mona Lisa hates commitment and runs through men at her own leisure. Her only real relationship was back in college with a man named Nat, whom she ran from when things started to get too real. Nat turns back up in Mona's life and she has to face some harsh realities about herself.

At the end of each of the stories, it is a Valentine's Day and each woman goes alone to a club in NYC to celebrate and they wind up talking and becoming good friends, despite the fact that they've all been living in the same house and never bothered to get to know each other beforehand. There's no real closure to any of their stories. All the women are basically the same with no real characterization or growth (beautiful, fashionable, successful, unlucky in love). The character of Jerome was annoying and I was tired of seeing him pop up in every story.

I give this a 3 because I did like Dior and Chloe's stories, but the rest I could've done without.



View all my reviews

Source: Library
Challenges: 100 Books in a Year