Happy and You Know It by Laura Hankin, a review

Happy and You Know It’s Back-of-Book Description

“For fans of Sex and the City and The Nanny Diaries comes this juicy story…that would make even the most meticulously Drybar-ed hair curl.”—Good Housekeeping

A dark, witty page-turner about a struggling young musician who takes a job singing for a playgroup of overprivileged babies and their effortlessly cool moms, only to find herself pulled into their glamorous lives and dangerous secrets….
 
After her former band shot to superstardom without her, Claire reluctantly agrees to a gig as a playgroup musician for wealthy infants on New York’s Park Avenue. Claire is surprised to discover that she is smitten with her new employers, a welcoming clique of wellness addicts with impossibly shiny hair, who whirl from juice cleanse to overpriced miracle vitamins to spin class with limitless energy.
 
There is perfect hostess Whitney who is on the brink of social-media stardom and just needs to find a way to keep her flawless life from falling apart. Caustically funny, recent stay-at-home mom Amara who is struggling to embrace her new identity. And old money, veteran mom Gwen who never misses an opportunity to dole out parenting advice. But as Claire grows closer to the stylish women who pay her bills, she uncovers secrets and betrayals that no amount of activated charcoal can fix.
 
Filled with humor and shocking twists, Happy and You Know It is a brilliant take on motherhood – exposing it as yet another way for society to pass judgment on women – while also exploring the baffling magnetism of curated social-media lives that are designed to make us feel unworthy. But, ultimately, this dazzling novel celebrates the unlikely bonds that form, and the power that can be unlocked, when a group of very different women is thrown together when each is at her most vulnerable.

My Thoughts

This was an add-on purchase for one of my Book of the Month boxes recently. I thought the description sounded fun and witty enough to put it on my shelf.

I just recently got done binging a very emotionally heavy and plot twisty drama (How To Get Away with Murder – highly recommend it!), so when I finished, I wanted something light and breezy. Happy and You Know It looked like the perfect option!

And I was right – it was great! I finished it in under a week.

As a woman with no kids, I worried for a moment that it wasn’t going to be my kind of book. After all, it’s about a group of moms. But the story was interesting enough and once I got started I was breezing right through it. And there were ‘spicy’ things happening often enough that I had to see what would happen next.

Also, there was a twist near the end that I actually did not see coming. I mean I knew there would be a twist, but I didn’t predict what actually happened! So that was fun. 

My main takeaway is that while there is a little bit of relationship stuff, the story is really more about friendship and getting to know people you wouldn’t normally meet. I really liked that. 

The characters were all compelling in their own ways, some of them with their own goals and story arcs, but the main plot focused on a select few. This means of course that there were some characters who stayed pretty flat, and you never really learned much about them.

The settings were interesting. It mostly takes place in wealthy people’s homes in New York and, while I can’t say I’m personally familiar with that, I had no trouble picturing it all in my mind.

The writing was light and full of fun, witty humor. The author did a great job of keeping things pretty surface level, going just deep enough to get the reader interested. This is exactly what people (including me usually) look for in a ‘beach read’. However, if you grab this looking for something deeper, you’re going to be disappointed.

Favorite Quotes from Happy and You Know It

“To [her], babies were like seeds. Interesting for what they might grow into but, for the moment, just dry, dull kernels. If she had to stare at a seed all day she’d go insane.”

 

“She was never alone. She was so lonely.”

 

“She’d paraded from Ohio to New York like an emperor but – surprise! – she hadn’t been wearing any clothes. The story didn’t talk about the emporor afterward, did it? How he felt when everyone realized he’d been duped, that his expensive new suit was no suit at all? She wanted to know what had gone through the emperor’s head, how he’d dealt with it…The story didn’t respect him enough to say.”

 

“The truth is just that sometimes you think you’re a good person, and then little by little, you justify your way into being a bad one.”

In Conclusion

I’m gonna say 3.5 stars. It was a decent book that kept my attention, but there were some pretty silly, hard to believe or relate to bits.  I also wouldn’t have minded a little more depth and character exploration. Or at least a little more about what happened to them after the twist. 

So yeah, it’s not going down on my favorites list, but I definitely appreciated it for the week. And I would absolutely still recommend Happy and You Know It to all my mom friends (or people who have friends who are moms) that are looking for a nice beach read about female friendships.

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