Sex is a prominent theme in Lesley Lokko's latest novel, A Private Affair. The book explores sex that is violent, naughty, raunchy, illicit. From the start of the novel, which weaves together the disparate lives of four female characters, Lokko explores the intimate physical relationship between men and women and how sex can be used to comfort, connect, avenge and destroy.

The first character we meet is Sam Maitland, a classy, beautiful entertainment lawyer who is defined by her love of labels. Whether it is Blahnik, LK Bennett or La Perla, Lokko never misses an opportunity to reveal what the independent legal high-flyer is wearing. Later we learn that it is because of Maitland's awkward childhood that she has become emotionally superficial, finding fulfilment in material things.

Meaghan Astor is an abused runaway from the Australian outback who meets a tall, good-looking soldier about to be transferred to the British army. She promptly marries him. Her life becomes a haze of lonely nights in distant army barracks that are uniformly dull. Finding the other army wives difficult to befriend, she leads a rather dismal and solitary life, endlessly waiting for her husband to return from duty.

The epitome of the perfect army wife, Abby Barclay grew up an army brat, groomed by her parents to become everything an officer would require in a wife. She is self-assured, self-sacrificing and a wonderful hostess. Her most admired quality is being able to turn a featureless apartment into a home. From the outside she looks satisfied and in control of her life, but inside she quietly regrets having given up her life to be in service of her husband's career.

The fourth protagonist is a young woman from Freetown, Sierra Leone, Dani Kingsley-Safo, an exquisite teenager who lives with her grandmother and frequents the local bars, where she relies on foreign soldiers to buy her drinks.

An unpleasant experience with a man forces her to reconsider her life and reassess the people with whom she spends her time. She finds fulfilment by setting up Hopewell House, a home in Freetown for young pregnant girls.

The common thread that links the stories of the four women is their connection with Nick Beasdale, an officer in the British army who irrevocably changes all their lives.

A Private Affair reads like a pedestrian chick-lit and it is only towards the end of the book that a darker, more thrilling strand of the narrative is exposed that links it with the first few pages. Descriptions throughout are cliched and the characters of the protagonists are never fully developed, although the context of their psychology is explored. Ultimately the life trajectory of the four women is defined by men. Even Sam , the independent career woman, gives up her life to pursue a man.

Lokko, however, makes no claims to writing didactic literary or feminist novels. Already on her sixth successful book since 2004, Lokko openly admits to churning out her manuscripts according to a formula.

''Feeling a little disenchanted with my chosen profession of architecture, I was travelling on the London underground when I read an article in Time Out magazine: The A to Z guide to writing a blockbuster. I followed it word for word and six books later, they're all sell-outs."

''The secret to success with commercial women's fiction is lots of shopping, sex and glamour. I throw in some armchair psychology and I try to articulate my own interest in the dynamic power relationship between men and women," she says.

A Private Affair no doubt appeared in the beach bags of women around the world during the recent holiday season. Her books may not be remembered in the annuls of great writing but they certainly are rip roaring good reads.

''I want my books to be seen as a bit of escapism," says Lokko.

''A space for women to get out of their own lives and live in someone else's for a bit."

• A Private Affair is published by Jonathan Ball, R190

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