When Life Gives you Lululemons by Lauren Weisberger

Title: When Life Gives you Lululemons

Author: Lauren Weisberger

Read by:  Laura Benanti

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Length: Approximately 10 hours and 14 minutes

Source: Review Copy from Simon & Schuster.  Thank-you!

I have been a fan of Lauren Weisberger since The Devil Wears Prada.  I can even partially thank her for my daughter’s name.  I was listening to the audiobook for Everyone Worth Knowing when my husband walked in and liked how the heroine’s best friend was named Penelope and called Penn for short.  He didn’t like too many girl names, so I made note of it.  Then in 2010 we had a daughter and named her Penelope!

When Life Gives you Lululemons is in the same world as the Devil Wears Prada.  Miranda’s snarky top assistant, Emily has moved on from Runway and has created her own business which helps guide stars through disasters and also helps them with fashion.  At the start of the novel, Emily finds herself being fired from jobs and replaced with a younger person.  Depressed, she decides to visit her friend Miriam while she’s in New York City. Miriam and Emily are friends from camp in their youth.  Will Emily be able to get her career back on track? 

Miriam was a high-profile NYC lawyer juggling three kids before her husband struck it rich with an invention.  They moved out to Greenwich Connecticut and Miriam stays home with the kids.  Miriam can’t believe the life she is living in Greenwich with women getting plastic surgery and obsessed with clothing and looks.  She’s also sad as her husband seems to be drifting away and their love life has taken a back seat to life with kids.   How can she get her life back on track? She’s stunned when she sees her old pal Karolina on TV for a drunk driving arrest.

Karolina is a former Victoria’s Secret model who is married to a senator and happily raising their son.  When she is pulled over for a drunk driving arrest even though she’s not drunk and spends the night in jail, her world is turned upside down.  Why has her husband not come to save her?  Why did they not do a breathalyzer test on her?  Karolina hides out in her Greenwich home and reconnects with Miriam and meets Emily. Will Emily be able to use her image consultant skills to help Karolina out?

I really enjoyed this novel.  I listened to it on audiobook and I didn’t want my drive to end!  It was engaging story with many laugh out loud moments.  There were also some great moments about mother hood and how there are many ways for a woman and mother to be happy.  I really loved the narrator, Laura Benanti.  She had great voices for the different characters.  I really liked her Eastern European accent for Karolina.

I also loved that Miranda Priestly made an appearance at the end of the novel and it was very Miranda like.  I thought this book was a great look at Emily’s life in the future and life after The Devil Wears Prada.  I loved that it focused on three very different characters and tied their lives and worries together.  It was a fun summer read. 

Overall, When Life Gives you Lululemons is a great beach read with fantastic characters and a storyline that is both funny, and heartfelt on women and motherhood.  It was a great addition to The Devil Wears Prada story, but you can read it as its own book if you’ve never read The Devil Wears Prada. The audiobook is also one of the best ones I’ve listened to this year.  Laura Benanti was a top-notch narrator.  It was a perfect book for audio.