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Master of the Game is a novel by Sidney Sheldon, first published in hardback format in 1982.The novel has won critical acclaim, debuting at number one on the New York Times Bestseller List.The plot of the book spans six generations, and it is based upon the fictional lives of the MacGregor/Blackwell family. The book follows the life of an entrepreneur, Kate Blackwell, and explores her family, ancestry and life. It focuses on the building of her father's company, from a small business into a multinational corporation.
The story begins with Kate Blackwell's ninetieth birthday celebrations in 1982 and is told in flashback.
The story then moves one hundred years back to the arrival of Scotsman James "Jamie" MacGregor (1865-1894) in Johannesburg, South Africa in 1883 to seek his fortune. He is soon defrauded by a wealthy Dutch storekeeper, Salomon Van Der Merwe who steals his diamonds, gets him knocked down and leaves him in the desert to die. Jamie is rescued by van der Merwe's Bantu servant Banda and in his company, Jamie plans his revenge. The two sneak into van der Merwe's heavily guarded diamond mines in the Namib Desert and succeed in stealing a load of diamonds worth a fortune. Jamie, now rugged and unrecognizable, returns to Johannesburg, cons Salomon into believing him to be a rich businessman and violates his daughter Margaret who gradually falls in love with him. However, when Jamie learns that Margaret is pregnant by him, he refuses to marry her and reveals to Salomon his true identity. The violation of Margaret's chastity becomes the talk of the town and Salomon dies soon afterwards, an unhappy man. Jamie, initially, despises Margaret, but when she gives birth to a son, Jamie develops extreme fondness of his son and consents to marrying Margaret for the sake of their young son, Jamie Jr. (1886-1893). Jamie creates a company called Kruger Brent (named after two guards who were calling each other in the diamond field) and pours all his attention into the business. Over the years, Jamie finally abandons his vendetta and genuinely begins to love Margaret. In 1892, Jamie and Margaret have a daughter Kate. A year later, Jamie, Jr. is murdered in a Bantu uprising led by Banda, causing Jamie to have a stroke from which he later dies. Margaret takes over Kruger Brent to secure Kate's future and hires a young American named David Blackwell (1870-1924), a thief who tried to rob the Kruger Brent diamond mines but was caught and employed as a company executive by Jamie out of sympathy (since he and Banda did the same thing), to aid her.
Kate grows up beautiful, strong-willed and manipulative. Having fallen in love with David Blackwell as a child she is determined to marry him, and thwarts his engagement by buying the company owned by his fiancee's father. After many years of trying Kate becomes pregnant, but when she is seven months pregnant David is killed in a mine accident, causing her to go into premature labor and give birth to a son, Anthony "Tony" Blackwell (b. 1924). Like her father before her Kate pours her life into Kruger Brent, making it a global conglomerate, and she moves to New York. She naturally expects Tony to take over Kruger Brent, but Tony is more interested in becoming an artist. While he clearly has the potential to become a world-famous artist, Kate secretly destroys Tony's career by bribing a notable French critic to give negative comments on Tony's work. Kate manipulates him into marrying Marianne Hoffmann, whose father owns a scientific patent she covets. The marriage is happy, but Marianne is told by a doctor that pregnancy is out of the question as she would be at risk for a stroke. When she tells Kate this, Kate tells her that doctors can be wrong and to go ahead with a pregnancy. In 1950, Marianne becomes pregnant, but when she is taken to the hospital to give birth her blood pressure goes out of control and she has a stroke. An emergency Caesarian section is performed and twin girls are delivered, but Marianne dies before the second girl is delivered. Her doctor tells Tony that he had warned Marianne of the dangers but that Kate told her to ignore them. The incident drives Tony mad and he tries to kill his mother in revenge. She survives the murder attempt, but Tony is committed to an institution.
Kate takes in her two granddaughters, whom she names Eve and Alexandra, to raise. Eve sees Alexandra as an interloper and repeatedly attempts to kill her starting when they are young children, taking advantage of their identical looks. Alexandra is thought to be clumsy and accident-prone as they grow up and Kate clearly favors Eve as the heir apparent to Kruger Brent, but when Eve tries to implicate Alexandra in a sex scandal Kate realizes the truth about Eve and disinherits her, giving her only a small allowance. Enraged, Eve plots revenge against both her sister and grandmother. She meets George Mellis, the black sheep of a wealthy Greek family, and seduces him into helping her. Mellis is handsome and cultured, but he is also a violent sadist and homosexual. Eve, knowing this, holds it over his head as she reveals her scheme--to get Alexandra to fall in love with and marry him, after which he will murder her and cause Kate to die of grief. Cued by Eve, Mellis woos Alexandra by being the perfect man who loves all the things she loves, and Alexandra does fall madly in love with him and they marry. Eve continues to taunt Mellis, and one night he snaps and attacks Eve, brutally assaulting her. She eventually recovers thanks to the work of a talented but mousy plastic surgeon and uses the beating to get back into her grandmother's good graces. Kate takes Eve back in and puts her back in the will, making Mellis superfluous. Eve changes tactics, fakes a scar, and begins visiting a psychiatrist pretending to be a depressed, suicidal Alexandra; the plan is that Mellis will take Alexandra out on a yacht where he'll throw her overboard and make it appear as if she killed herself. When Mellis gets on the boat with whom he believes to be Alexandra, he instead finds Eve, who stabs him to death. In the course of the investigation Eve's plastic surgeon, Dr. Keith Webster, overhears a remark about the scar on Eve's head. Having fallen in love with her, he goes to her and reminds her that he left no scar and knows that she killed Mellis. When she tries to deny it, he offers her a deal--if they are married, he won't be forced to testify against her. Eve marries him but cheats on him flagrantly with a young actor. When the actor makes a joke about laugh lines she demands that Webster repair them. Webster deliberately destroys her face and proves to be a master manipulator himself, making Eve completely dependent on him. Alexandra, meanwhile, falls in love with the psychiatrist Peter Templeton; they marry and have a son, Robert.
The book closes at Kate's ninetieth birthday party with all her relatives present. Robert, now seven, is turning into a talented pianist. Kate sees him as Kruger Brent's heir but Alexandra and Peter laugh her off. Looking around at her family, including Tony, who was released from the institution for the occasion, and a masked Eve, Kate still believes that she acted properly, even though everyone in her family has been negatively affected by her actions.
The story begins with Kate Blackwell's ninetieth birthday celebrations in 1982 and is told in flashback.
The story then moves one hundred years back to the arrival of Scotsman James "Jamie" MacGregor (1865-1894) in Johannesburg, South Africa in 1883 to seek his fortune. He is soon defrauded by a wealthy Dutch storekeeper, Salomon Van Der Merwe who steals his diamonds, gets him knocked down and leaves him in the desert to die. Jamie is rescued by van der Merwe's Bantu servant Banda and in his company, Jamie plans his revenge. The two sneak into van der Merwe's heavily guarded diamond mines in the Namib Desert and succeed in stealing a load of diamonds worth a fortune. Jamie, now rugged and unrecognizable, returns to Johannesburg, cons Salomon into believing him to be a rich businessman and violates his daughter Margaret who gradually falls in love with him. However, when Jamie learns that Margaret is pregnant by him, he refuses to marry her and reveals to Salomon his true identity. The violation of Margaret's chastity becomes the talk of the town and Salomon dies soon afterwards, an unhappy man. Jamie, initially, despises Margaret, but when she gives birth to a son, Jamie develops extreme fondness of his son and consents to marrying Margaret for the sake of their young son, Jamie Jr. (1886-1893). Jamie creates a company called Kruger Brent (named after two guards who were calling each other in the diamond field) and pours all his attention into the business. Over the years, Jamie finally abandons his vendetta and genuinely begins to love Margaret. In 1892, Jamie and Margaret have a daughter Kate. A year later, Jamie, Jr. is murdered in a Bantu uprising led by Banda, causing Jamie to have a stroke from which he later dies. Margaret takes over Kruger Brent to secure Kate's future and hires a young American named David Blackwell (1870-1924), a thief who tried to rob the Kruger Brent diamond mines but was caught and employed as a company executive by Jamie out of sympathy (since he and Banda did the same thing), to aid her.
Kate grows up beautiful, strong-willed and manipulative. Having fallen in love with David Blackwell as a child she is determined to marry him, and thwarts his engagement by buying the company owned by his fiancee's father. After many years of trying Kate becomes pregnant, but when she is seven months pregnant David is killed in a mine accident, causing her to go into premature labor and give birth to a son, Anthony "Tony" Blackwell (b. 1924). Like her father before her Kate pours her life into Kruger Brent, making it a global conglomerate, and she moves to New York. She naturally expects Tony to take over Kruger Brent, but Tony is more interested in becoming an artist. While he clearly has the potential to become a world-famous artist, Kate secretly destroys Tony's career by bribing a notable French critic to give negative comments on Tony's work. Kate manipulates him into marrying Marianne Hoffmann, whose father owns a scientific patent she covets. The marriage is happy, but Marianne is told by a doctor that pregnancy is out of the question as she would be at risk for a stroke. When she tells Kate this, Kate tells her that doctors can be wrong and to go ahead with a pregnancy. In 1950, Marianne becomes pregnant, but when she is taken to the hospital to give birth her blood pressure goes out of control and she has a stroke. An emergency Caesarian section is performed and twin girls are delivered, but Marianne dies before the second girl is delivered. Her doctor tells Tony that he had warned Marianne of the dangers but that Kate told her to ignore them. The incident drives Tony mad and he tries to kill his mother in revenge. She survives the murder attempt, but Tony is committed to an institution.
Kate takes in her two granddaughters, whom she names Eve and Alexandra, to raise. Eve sees Alexandra as an interloper and repeatedly attempts to kill her starting when they are young children, taking advantage of their identical looks. Alexandra is thought to be clumsy and accident-prone as they grow up and Kate clearly favors Eve as the heir apparent to Kruger Brent, but when Eve tries to implicate Alexandra in a sex scandal Kate realizes the truth about Eve and disinherits her, giving her only a small allowance. Enraged, Eve plots revenge against both her sister and grandmother. She meets George Mellis, the black sheep of a wealthy Greek family, and seduces him into helping her. Mellis is handsome and cultured, but he is also a violent sadist and homosexual. Eve, knowing this, holds it over his head as she reveals her scheme--to get Alexandra to fall in love with and marry him, after which he will murder her and cause Kate to die of grief. Cued by Eve, Mellis woos Alexandra by being the perfect man who loves all the things she loves, and Alexandra does fall madly in love with him and they marry. Eve continues to taunt Mellis, and one night he snaps and attacks Eve, brutally assaulting her. She eventually recovers thanks to the work of a talented but mousy plastic surgeon and uses the beating to get back into her grandmother's good graces. Kate takes Eve back in and puts her back in the will, making Mellis superfluous. Eve changes tactics, fakes a scar, and begins visiting a psychiatrist pretending to be a depressed, suicidal Alexandra; the plan is that Mellis will take Alexandra out on a yacht where he'll throw her overboard and make it appear as if she killed herself. When Mellis gets on the boat with whom he believes to be Alexandra, he instead finds Eve, who stabs him to death. In the course of the investigation Eve's plastic surgeon, Dr. Keith Webster, overhears a remark about the scar on Eve's head. Having fallen in love with her, he goes to her and reminds her that he left no scar and knows that she killed Mellis. When she tries to deny it, he offers her a deal--if they are married, he won't be forced to testify against her. Eve marries him but cheats on him flagrantly with a young actor. When the actor makes a joke about laugh lines she demands that Webster repair them. Webster deliberately destroys her face and proves to be a master manipulator himself, making Eve completely dependent on him. Alexandra, meanwhile, falls in love with the psychiatrist Peter Templeton; they marry and have a son, Robert.
The book closes at Kate's ninetieth birthday party with all her relatives present. Robert, now seven, is turning into a talented pianist. Kate sees him as Kruger Brent's heir but Alexandra and Peter laugh her off. Looking around at her family, including Tony, who was released from the institution for the occasion, and a masked Eve, Kate still believes that she acted properly, even though everyone in her family has been negatively affected by her actions.
