Charles D. Martin's PROVOCATEUR Sizzles with Money Schemes, Sensuous Women

Related: PROVOCATEUR,

Venture capitalist Charles Martin has released his first novel, "Provocateur," (www.provocateurbook.com) a story of ingenious, multi-million-dollar schemes that draw heavily on his financial and technological background.

The novel explores an aspect of the human experience that surrounds the age-old contest between men and women. It is the story of Nadia, a young Russian woman who comes to America through a mail-order-bride program.

"I am fascinated by strong, intelligent women," says Martin, who grew up in a poor household and went on to have a distinguished career in venture capital and private equity. "'Provocateur' is about the contest between an audacious woman and powerful men. It explores and celebrates the sources of a woman's powers over men."

Nadia, abandoned at birth and raised in a bleak Russian orphanage with no love or tenderness, is, nonetheless, a brilliant and beautiful girl. To escape a hopeless future, she becomes a mail-order bride and weds an American. But the overseas matches have an ulterior purpose: to find young women with the right stuff to execute schemes that part millionaires from their money.

"Wow! Provocateur sizzles! Fiction? Perhaps, but this taut thriller shoots you right into today's high-wire world of global intrigue, collapsing financial markets and the pulsing tension between brilliant, sensuous women and cunning, powerful men," raves Harvey Karp, best-selling author of "The Happiest Baby" series.

Nadia becomes employed in an enterprise operated by an ex-CIA agent named Olga, whose agency, through clever missions, enrich both her and her hand-chosen "agents." Nadia's "assignments" require her to get the best of alpha males that are at the top of the male order.

Charles Martin runs Mont Pelerin Capital, LLC, and serves on the investment committees of prominent universities. An established business writer, his first novel focuses on the intrigue that often exists between alpha females that take on -- and conquer -- dominant males. Martin lives with his wife in a coastal town south of Los Angeles.