The Adventures of Juan Planchard

by Jonathan Jakubowicz

Genres: Crime Fiction; Political Thrillers

Synopsis

Already an underground hit in Latin America, this is The Wolf of Wall Street meets Scarface in a wild, fast-paced ride through sex, drugs, revolution, and the morally gray hustle of a man who dares to game the system that destroyed his country.

“My name is Juan Planchard. I’m twenty-nine years old, and I have five million dollars in my account. I own a house in Caracas, another in Madrid, and a high-rise apartment in New York. I run a sportsbook at the Palms Hotel in Las Vegas. I share a private jet with a friend’s frontman. And I’m convinced—down to my bones—that every decision I made during the revolution was the right one. My descendants will thank me.”
 
So begins The Adventures of Juan Planchard, the story of a middle-class nobody turned millionaire by weaponizing the very corruption that swallowed Venezuela. He dines with oligarchs, sleeps with models, and navigates a world where power is the only currency—and morality is a luxury no one can afford. But in the middle of the chaos, greed, and blood money, Juan falls hard for Scarlet, a sharp, seductive American beauty who just might be his way out—or his ultimate downfall.     

Release date: June 2, 2026

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing

Print pages: 288

Sample

My name is Juan Planchard. I’m twenty-nine years old, and I have five million dollars in my bank account. I own a house in Caracas, another in Madrid, and a high-rise apartment in New York. I run a sportsbook at the Palms Hotel in Las Vegas. I share a private jet with a business partner. And I’m convinced—down to my bones—that every decision I made during the revolution was the right one. My descendants will thank me.

It took me a while to understand. I used to believe that the moral good and the collective good were the same thing, and that looking out only for yourself was the ultimate evil. But I got tired of being broke and started paying attention.

My country elected a man who believes in nothing but loyalty. He doesn’t care what you do, as long as you don’t cross him.

So why fight him? Who am I to tell the people they’re wrong for believing in a man who makes them feel seen?

No one.

Thinking the majority is wrong is a form of self-flattery. The people don’t get it wrong. If they stay in love with a man for over a decade, it’s because they want him in power. Adaptation is the only principle that matters. And adapting means learning how to play the game.

It’s like The Untouchables—Kevin Costner spends the whole film hunting down Al Capone for bootlegging, and the moment Prohibition ends, he pours himself a drink.

That’s me. If the game is rigged for hustlers, then hustle.

And the truth is, we’ve always been ahead of the curve. All the chaos your country’s just starting to figure out—corruption, messiah complex, polarization—we already lived it in Venezuela. My poor, rich country.

Once the “Saudi Arabia of Latin America.” We used to call ourselves the richest nation on Earth, like it was a birthright. We liberated half the continent from colonial Spain. We toppled our dictators decades before the rest of the region even thought about it. And when our democracy started to stink of privilege, half our army followed a paratrooper straight into revolution.

Now it’s 2011, and that paratrooper—Comandante Hugo Chávez—has ruled us for twelve years. The poor worship him as their savior. And we’ve got no choice but to milk that.

I made my money through Cadivi, like every moderately intelligent man who lived in Venezuela in the 2000s. I’ll get deeper into it later, but if you’re not Venezuelan, let me explain the basics: Cadivi was the government’s foreign currency exchange system. It created two separate dollar prices—one official, one real. And the real dollar was worth at least twice the official rate.

The trick? Get dollars at the official rate, flip them at market value, double your money. No sweat. No risk. How do you get legal dollars? You just need the right friends in the right offices.

That was how fortunes were made. Not through invention. Not through hard work. Just knowing names.

A perfect crime is no longer a crime when the whole country participates. It becomes a culture. And if you didn’t see it, it’s because you didn’t want to.

I have friends in the arms trade who have already earned more than eighty million. But guns leave a trace. Serial numbers, paper trails, the kind of mistakes that get you banned from the American Empire. And that? That I won’t touch. Five million is enough. Caracas is too dangerous anyway. I’d rather spend my time in the United States, where capitalism is in crisis and everything is on clearance.

And I mean everything. From penthouses in Manhattan to women with skin like polished marble. The kind you only see in Playboy. Eight grand for a night. Six figures for a week. Well-raised girls, the type you simply don’t find in Venezuela.

Yes, we win Miss Universe. But let’s be honest—most Venezuelan women are rotten. Every man who’s left the country knows this. The ones who say otherwise are the same ones who still believe Venezuela is paradise. They’re not just wrong. They’re blind.

And if anyone back home wants to get angry, I couldn’t care less. I’ve made my money. And if that means I can never return to that crumbling mess, then so be it.

This isn’t a political story. It’s a love story. But not a middle-class love, which is no more than upward mobility in disguise. Nor the love of the poor, bound by shared misery. No. This is a love story between people who already have serious money. For us, love isn’t a distraction from hardship, but the one thing left that still matters.

There are these swingers’ parties in Las Vegas. Absolute debauchery. They only let in single women who are fine and couples under thirty-five. The cover? Twenty grand per guy (women walk in free). They rent out the penthouses at the Palms. Four suites, each with four bedrooms, all connected. Vast spaces—one even has a half-court basketball setup in the living room (probably for the NBA guys). Jacuzzis, swings, saunas, mattresses that fit fifteen people, every imaginable toy and gadget. Floor-to-ceiling windows overlook the Vegas Strip—the gaudy neon artery of the city, complete with its off-kilter Eiffel Tower replica and theme hotels catering to the worst kind of tourists.

The best part? Most of the couples aren’t really couples. A guy under thirty-five willing to drop twenty grand on a night out is not in the market for commitment. And if he is in a relationship, he sure as hell isn’t bringing his girl to a swingers’ party in Vegas. So all hundred women arriving with a date—plus the fifty coming solo—are on the lookout, scanning the room, calculating their next move.

It’s a feast. The parties start at three in the morning, and by four, full-blown orgies break out—orgies, I swear, that put the one I had at Gaddafi’s palace to shame (I might tell you about that one later).

I had just landed in Vegas with my partner for the night—a Brazilian actress I met three years ago, December 2008, in Punta del Este. Our noses were numb from the coke we’d been doing on my private jet (a Challenger 300, twenty-five million dollars’ worth of airborne decadence, with porcelain dishes and waiters serving manchego with melon). A Lincoln Town Car picked us up and took us to the Venetian—not exactly close to the Palms.

“Why aren’t we staying at the Palms?” she asked, her Portuguese-tinged Spanish smooth and lazy.

“Never stay at the hotel where you party,” I said. “In case things go south and you need to disappear.”

She was stunning. But I was too wired to make a move just yet. Besides, the plan was to save my energy for the main event later that night.

At the hotel, she stepped into the glass-walled Venetian-style shower and started singing some Sérgio Mendes song. I crushed more coke, getting everything ready, while I studied her: light brown hair with jet-black roots from the salon. Wide, apple-shaped hips—Brazilian hips, the kind you can only find in that country. Her face was part Portuguese, part African. A little like Rihanna. Her tits—perfectly done.

I don’t remember her name. Maybe I never knew it. But watching her, naked and singing, with the Vegas skyline glowing behind her, in my enormous, impersonal suite—Prosecco poured, a California king bed waiting—one thought slipped in: I had everything. And I wasn’t happy.

Money doesn’t buy happiness. But it buys something so close that it takes maturity to know the difference. Only a millionaire understands this. And the real tragedy? No one has figured out what brings happiness after you already have everything. It’s brutal. Few understand that too much success is just as suffocating as too much failure.

But I was in Vegas. Feeling sorry for myself in Vegas would be pathetic. So I did what anyone in my position would do: I decided to drown out the ache in my soul with the pleasures of my body.

In a sudden, philosophical frenzy, I did two more lines, stepped into the shower, and started fucking her—standing up, from the side, telling her to not stop singing.

I drove into her again and again. Tried to shake off every intrusive thought. In, out. In, out. Over and over. Until that rhythm—her bouncing ass, my body moving against hers—synced perfectly with the high, the cocaine’s euphoric charge flooding my veins.

And yes. For three minutes and thirty seconds, I forgot.

I forgot that everything I had was still not enough.

As the sex went on, I started feeling good. Maybe my search for something more was just beginning, but I wasn’t doing too bad. Every decision I had made had brought me closer to absolute happiness—the kind that lurked just beyond the flawless curves in front of me. The kind only the truly blessed ever get to taste.

Afterward, we hit the casino.

And that was where the best part of my life began.

What follows are the direct messages sent via Twitter, between Scarlet and her boyfriend, Michael.

The casino at the Venetian must be a square kilometer. I walked it end to end, my Brazilian clinging to my arm, drawing stares. Finally, I reached the pro poker table—five grand minimum buy-in.

I took a seat and, like any decent player, started studying the competition. Across from me, two Chinese guys in knockoff Gucci suits. Next to them, a Russian in an open white silk shirt, his chest sunburned raw. Beside him, an ancient American, maybe a hundred years old, nodding off mid-hand. Then, a bloated fifty-something with a gut hanging over his belt. And next to him…

Next to him… was her.

I froze. Her eyes landed on me and cut through my soul. My heart started hammering—faster than a crack baby’s—and in that moment, I knew. I knew I had found what I’d been looking for. She was my path, whoever she was. That girl sitting at the pro poker table at the Venetian. She was my destiny. I had become a millionaire, I had come to Vegas, all to find her.

Now all that was left was to act.

Without breaking eye contact, I cashed in fifty grand. Nothing. She didn’t even blink. The man sitting next to her—probably her father—must have given her everything she ever wanted since she was a child. Money meant nothing to her. And that was what I liked most about her.

She glanced at me, indifferent, then leaned against the old man’s shoulder. For a moment, a terrible thought crossed my mind: What if he’s not her father? What if he’s her lover? That would be the end of everything. If this perfect, delicate girl in her twenties was selling herself to that disgusting, swollen relic for money, then the void inside me was unfillable. The hope of finding pure, honest love would be dead, and I’d be doomed to a lifetime of loneliness. A loneliness lined with firm, exquisite asses—but loneliness all the same.

Even if he was her lover, I would fight for her. I had no choice. If it meant giving up my entire fortune and flying back to Venezuela to hustle up another bag of cash, I would do it. For her. To be with her forever. Nothing and no one would stand in my way.

The Brazilian noticed. She caught my gaze, questioning. It was obvious: I had to get rid of her. But her name was on the guest list for the swingers’ party—I couldn’t get in without her. I needed a boomerang—something to take her away for a moment, then bring her back.

I pulled out my wallet and handed her my Cadivi card. The Bolivarian government’s annual spending limit for its citizens was four thousand dollars. Pocket change. She’d go, buy some junk, and come back asking for more. That was how Cadivi worked—always there for you, in good times and bad.

She left, happy. And I stayed at the table. The bloated old man, who may or may not have been the father of the love of my life. Two Chinese guys. A Russian. A geriatric American. Her. And me.

I lost five grand on the first hand. And then the miracle happened.

The bloated old man got up to go to the bathroom. And just like that, she was alone. Sitting there, waiting. Guarding his chips. Bored. Completely unaware that across the table, a multimillionaire was ready to risk it all for her.

“Where are you from?” I asked.

“Los Angeles,” she said.

My pulse quickened. “Are you an actress?”

She shook her head, slightly offended by the question.

I did the math. I had about forty seconds before the old man came back. “Is that your dad?”

“Yes.”

I exhaled. “What, are you guys on vacation?”

“Yeah.”

The old man was on his way back. I had to move fast.

“Take my card,” I said. “Email me if you need anything.”

She took it hesitantly. “Do you live here?”

“No, but I know a lot of people.”

“Where are you from?”

“I live between New York, Vegas, and Caracas. Wherever work takes me. I’m from Venezuela.”

I think she liked that. Her expression softened. Her guard dropped.

Then her lips curved into a quiet, knowing smile—and for the first time in my life, I was completely happy.

The old man and the Brazilian returned at the same time. For a second, I wondered if they had fucked in the bathroom and if we were the fools. But I dismissed the thought just as quickly.

The Brazilian was back because Cadivi had declined the charge. She was gone just long enough for me to get what I needed, and it hadn’t cost me a dime. That’s life—poetic. Cadivi was working for me once again, bouncing her away like her ass had bounced against my hips earlier that night. A reminder that I was born to win, and that nothing would stand between me and what I deserved.

I picked up my remaining chips without even checking how much I had lost. It didn’t matter.

That night, at that table, I had won.

I walked away, smiling at the woman of my life. She slipped my card into the pocket of her jeans and met my gaze with a look of quiet complicity. She knew it, too. She knew we were meant for each other. That the time spent apart had already ended.

Outside, the Brazilian and I climbed into a Hummer limo. She pouted, playfully complaining about the card being declined. Said I had done it on purpose, that I was cheap. But I wasn’t listening.

I was thinking about her.

Through the tinted window, the Strip stretched out in neon glory, a kingdom laid at my feet. Not because I had money. But because I had her.

Caesars Palace, where Roman excess had been repackaged for Midwestern dads in ill-fitting cargo shorts, where Muhammad Ali had fought beneath golden statues of emperors who never existed.

The Monte Carlo, the same one where Lady Di had tried to disappear, in the first triumph of Islam over the British Crown.

The Mandalay Bay, a golden cage where homophobic tigers occasionally ate their gay trainers.

Vegas was a monument to excess, a city with no past, no memory, no consequence. But tonight, it was mine.

Because I had her.

Whoever she was.

With those marihuana-green eyes and that quiet, calming smile, born to live beside me in eternal wisdom, her long lashes scraping against my soul.

We arrived at the Palms, but I had to make a stop at the sportsbook I had bought the year before. It was a prime setup—sixty screens, live feeds from every major racetrack in the world.

The business was run by El Duque, a Spaniard who looked like Ricky Martin and handled my operation with ruthless efficiency. We had met years ago at a dinner hosted by Pablo Iglesias, Hugo Chávez’s man in Spain, and we had been friends ever since.

El Duque greeted me, assured me the books were solid. We were set to clear half a million. I checked the numbers, threw him a twenty-grand bonus, and we did a few lines together before parting ways.

That night, Paul Oakenfold was playing at the Palms. A party called Perfecto. Nothing perfect about it. The guy had been repeating “The World Is Mine” for ten years straight, but honestly? The guy was broke. Electronic music went the way of rock—self-indulgent. Music isn’t meant to be self-indulgent. It’s an art form built on sharing sound. Nobody should make music for themselves. And if they do, they should shut the fuck up about it. The world is mine.

Fuck you, motherfucker.

The world is mine. Not yours.

The Brazilian loved Oakenfold. She told me she had lost her virginity at a rave in Copacabana, right there in the sand, to the sound of his beats. Hard to believe this woman had ever been a virgin, but fucking on the beach? Everyone knows that’s a terrible idea—doesn’t matter who you’re with.

She asked me to get her some Ecstasy. I waved over the VIP waiter, and he brought me two pills stamped with Che Guevara’s face. If it had been anyone else, I might have turned them down. But Che? Never. The man had given me everything. His legacy as a social avenger was also mine.

¡Hasta la victoria siempre, Comrade Che! I take this pill in honor of your memory as an unrelenting hero of freedom!

We all owe Che. Without him, we’d still be working for the gringos, getting paid shit salaries, making some Portuguese or Jewish capitalist richer, with zero cha. . .