Like everything Lauren Weisberger writes, I flew through Where the Grass is Green and the Girls are Pretty - while I couldn't really relate to Peyton herself, it was a quick read and relatable weekend escape. And as a mom of a daughter headed to college this fall, I felt all the feels as Max and Peyton's relationship twists and turns throughout the summer. I enjoyed the entire story and how neatly everything wraps up - that being said, the twist at the end made my eyes roll a little and makes the story seem unfinished. Looking forward to gifting to some mom friends for a Memorial Day weekend getaway! Thanks to #NetGalley for the opportunity to preview #WheretheGrassIsGreenandtheGirlsArePretty - I really enjoyed it!

I’m a huge fan of “The Devil Wears Prada” so I excited to start this book. However, it falls flat of being intriguing and a page turner.

Taken straight from the headlines, Peyton is involved in a college buying scandal. Rich people paying for their spoiled children to get accepted in an Ivy League school. I didn’t like it in real life and didn’t want to read about it in a fiction form.

2020 was a crazy year for everyone. We all faced problems and new normals so I know some books by some authors won’t live up to the hype.

This book follows Peyton, Skye, Max and Issac as they navigate a college admissions scandal. Each chapter rotates between the characters about how the scandal has affected their life. Overall it was a great book. I did like that each chapter was about each different character. However, the book seemed to slow down at the end
and left me wanting more.

I really really liked this book. Many of the synopses I read beforehand were super vague so I had no idea what I was really getting myself into, but I was very pleasantly surprised with the whole college admissions scandal theme at the center of the book. I really liked all the characters he found there struggles very relatable which made the book super enjoyable. It is definitely the type of book where some characters are very unlikeable and I was nervous I would be disappointed by the ending, but I definitely was not. Such a fun summer read that shows you how much of an impact what you think is a small decision can have on so many people.

Lauren Weisberger has written a quick and easy read about the college admissions scandal. I loved the beginning and was taken with her characteristic descriptions of the NY rich and famous. As the book went on, however, I felt that her look into this topic fell flat, lacking her usual snark and wit, as well as any unique take on the story. Aside from Max, the characters were unlikeable and I couldn't connect with them at all. I do look forward to reading whatever the author comes up with next. Thanks to Netgalley and Random House for the advance digital copy!

I really enjoy Lauren Weisburger's writing and she always makes me laugh out loud but this book was just ok for me. I had a hard time in the beginning enjoying the book but by the end I did like it. I felt like the characters felt very superficial and I didn't really connect with them. Thank you Netgalley and Random House Publishing Group-Random House for the ARC but all opinions are my own.

2.5. I absolutely loved When Life Gives You Lululemons by the same author, so I was super excited to get an advanced reader's copy of this one. The beginning was so intriguing. Peyton reminds me a lot of Alex from The Morning Show. I thought the routines she endured to keep her youthful on-air appearance were fascinating. I liked the titles of the chapters. I think the author is very creative. I just don't think the plot is that interesting overall. The whole parents paid for their child to get into an ivy league college storyline. I was done with that after about a chapter. I just wish there was so much more than that to this. It is interesting that this book digs deeper into the effect that one wrong move can affect a person's whole family, costing them opportunities. There are so many books that explore this like Defending Jacob. Can you tell I'm watching all the shows on AppleTV right now? lol. It does cause me to have empathy for the characters in different ways, and I like the deep real-life dive that "What you do, doesn't just affect you." I was really into it at first, and then it just took a nosedive for me. I got bored with it.

Thank you so much to #netgalley and #randomhousepublishinggroup #Laurenweisberger for this advanced reader's copy for an honest review.

I was disappointed that I didn't love this as much as I thought I would based on my immense enjoyment of the author's previous work. While the storyline was timely and relevant to the lessons I try to teach my students, I just couldn't connect with any of the characters. Peyton especially didn't have the chops to carry the story. Maybe someone with lower expectations would have loved this.

The plot of this book - around a college admission payout scandal, seemed so interesting and important in today's world. Weisberger captures the sky-high lifestyle of Peyton Marcus perfectly - famous tv anchor, obsessed with her waist size, designer bag, and more importantly - that Ivy League pedigree for her HS senior daughter. But when a scandal breaks at her news station - starring her very own husband, convicted of paying to get their daughter into Princeton... Peyton's world suddenly seems to crumble and sway. I liked the point of view from a parent that did this - wrote a check to get their child ahead in life - after all, we do this with jobs, friends, etc. "Let me talk to my friend who works in so and so and see if they can call in a favor..." However, I found Peyton's character so hard to enjoy it was difficult for me to keep going. She was extremely shallow and her husband, who it is agreed will take the fall of this (even though Peyton wrote the check and did the dirty deed), seemed so.... blah. Like where was the big fight! It was just lie on top of lie and I guess that was the point. The ended did a good job of tying up some loose ends but I think Peyton bothered me so much, it was hard for me to spend time with her on the page.

While the books is well written and very engaging, the topic it covers falls very, very flat and reflects a passé, almost elitist attitude. At times it came off purely as an excuse for why rich people use their excessive financial means to find the infamous “side door” into college, the same “side door” that landed Full House’s Aunt Becky and her real-life husband in jail. Now while as a parent I can understand that parents want the best for their children, I find the sense of entitlement rich people have quite appalling. And I find it disgusting that individuals who become parents and understand how hard it is for them not to see their children having everything, wouldn’t try to change the system so that no kid has to suffer, rather than to rig their own way into it. I found the couple’s “solution”, i.e. the husband sacrificed himself so that the wife doesn’t lose her plushier job, a reflection of the problem in the first place. Choosing to go to jail, ruin your relationships with your offspring and your in-laws, stain your pristine reputation, all because of money? This made me feel so sad for the state of, well, everything. And yet, I also found myself wanting the poor main character to get out of this mess intact, because, apart from the whole using the side door thing, she’s quite likeable. And that’s the main thing that I am taking away from this book: not to demonize anyone, because at the end of the day, demonizing doesn’t help dismantle the system that allows for these kinds of things to happen in the first place. If you want a well-written, multifaceted insight into how deep the problem of entitlement goes, this just might be the read for you, and a good contended as a book club read.

Lauren Weisberger offers a story about mothers whose lives didn't end up as they wanted or expected and a seventeen-year-old daughter of one of them, who finds her life is derailed by her parents' actions.

The college admissions scandal was all over the news at one point, and in this rendition of the story, the one we all know already happened. In fact, Peyton, free spirit teen turned beloved morning news anchor, covered the story. Now, a couple of years later, FBI agents arrest her husband, Isaac in connection with a similar bribe--a contribution made to a charity in exchange for an extra look at their daughter, Max's Princeton application. Soon, Peyton is ousted from her morning show and forced to take the summer off. In her mind, she's waiting for the media storm to pass, but those around her try to make her understand the severity of the situation. Skye, Peyton's sister who was always overachieving and now runs her local PTA, cannot be angrier at Isaac. Skye is working on a passion project, which is a home for underprivileged girls. The mission of her budding project cannot be more opposite to the entitlement and privilege that underlie Isaac's actions. Max, reeling from the media coverage and the betrayal she feels that her father didn't believe she could be admitted to Princeton on her own merit, distracts herself with filmmaking, her dream career.

So, I'm not sure what I was expecting when I started this book, but I don't think it met my expectations. When I started reading, I couldn't put it down, I made it about 30% through and then started having concerns that it wasn't going to do what I thought it was. For example, the pacing felt a bit off to me. I wanted more reflection instead of action, which there wasn't much of anyway. I wanted more conflict among the characters and less interiority when they were thinking through the actions that led them to this predicament. I also found Peyton kind of insufferable, and I don't think she ever really redeemed herself in my eyes. The characters could easily become caricatures, and I think they're a bit more fleshed out than that, but not by much. Skye, Peyton, and Max were all very surface level. There also wasn't the complete resolution of all the aspects of the story that, while reading, appear most important.

It was enjoyable, overall, but I don't know if it did enough to uniquely re-tell the college admission scandal. I enjoyed Weisberger's writing, but the story layout fell a bit short.

Would recommend to readers who love reading about wealthy families acting poorly, Weisberger's writing, and are interested in the college admission scandal.

Fans of Lauren Weisberger will enjoy this glimpse into the life of a media star and her family, with its emphasis on a ripped-from-the-headlines college admissions scandal and on the competitively privileged suburbs. Fans will also probably be more willing than I was to overlook the bland obliviousness of the ultra-privileged characters and narrative tone. I enjoy reading books about rich and/or awful people as much as the next beach reader, but I'm not sure this book is aware that its characters actually ARE awful. And some of their snobbiness just kind of makes no sense - like when Skye, a protagonist, and her friend mock another parent's name choice of Magnolia as "dramatic"...while Skye's kid is named Aurora. I just don't get what's going on here, if I'm being honest. These characters spend an awful lot of time judging and belittling the priorities, values, and taste levels of those around them...considering how legitimately insufferable and dismissively privileged they themselves are.

The story demands that the reader sympathize with a mom who engaged in a little light fraud in order to give her kid a leg up in getting into an Ivy League school, so maybe my expectations needed some adjusting. But I thought there’d be a little more self-awareness from the book as a whole, just a smidge more of a satirical touch when it came to these class-obsessed characters. And there really isn’t. That’s probably why the chapters from the POV of this mom, Peyton, are by far the most successful. As the parent whose obsession with her family’s perfection led to criminal actions, she has less room to pretend she’s holier than thou. Her sister Skye, on the other hand, a former teacher and now stay-at-home mom who yearns for professional fulfillment, just swans around through most of the book being a total snot about every other suburban mom she interacts with, like she’s somehow better than them because she...doesn’t wear yoga pants? She even manages to be inexplicably snobby about libraries having online renewal, a bit I fully do not understand. I could NOT bring myself to care about Skye’s envy of her former colleagues’ voluntourism work or her drama, involving getting way into debt buying furniture and decor for the girls’ residence home she’s starting as a charity/return to feeling smug about her work again.
Peyton’s daughter, Max, also gets POV chapters, and these scenes are the least successful mostly because Weisberger isn’t particularly strong at writing a teenage voice, but also because Max is genuinely an innocent here - albeit a fairly insufferable one in her own right - and there just isn’t much to cover in her chapters. She didn’t know about the fraud in the first place, she spends the majority of the book mad at the wrong parent, and she doesn’t have a lot going on - she gets rejected from the college she didn't even want to go to, she makes some friends, she has a successful vlog...okay. Whatever. She's somehow relatively flawless, so her journey, such as it is, never engaged me.

A lot of my problems with this book can be summed up in the fact that Skye never wears a single bit of makeup, and she doesn’t think about calories when she eats, all of which makes her better than Peyton and the other rich moms! But don’t worry, her complexion is flawless and she’s naturally slim, so she’s still acceptable as a POV character! It's all just a lot of hypocrisy and bewildering snobbish distinctions that don't...really...make sense??

It’s a readable book, I’ll give it that - fast and easy, smoothly written other than the handful of jarringly confusing "wait, but why are you being snotty about that?" moments. But it’s ultimately just a lot of nothing in insufferable packaging, and not really worth the time.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House for the advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

First off the title of this book is cheeky, so are most of the chapter titles and I am here for it! I dare anyone to say it aloud or read it and then not be tempted to sing the Guns-n-Roses song, Paradise City, for the rest of the day.

Peyton Marcus is a big deal morning news anchor for ANN (think Jennifer Aniston's character in Apple TV's The Morning Show). One day after she hosts the morning show she catches a glimpse of her husband being carted off to jail for getting wrapped up in an admissions scandal in which he tried to get their daughter, Max, admitted to Princeton. This sets off a chain reaction of events throughout the characters lives that force them to confront some deep-seeded beliefs/assumptions about themselves and their relationships with one another.

While I thought the book started off seemingly as superficial, it developed into something more along the way which made me end up enjoying it more than I thought I would. I think what I enjoyed most about this book were the relationships between Peyton, her daughter Max, and her sister Skye. The relationships weren't always easy, but Lauren Weisberger did a good job of testing the bonds amongst the women, chronicling their respective personal growth journeys and bringing them to a fitting/redeeming end.

If you enjoy books focusing on pop culture and the scandalous lives of privileged women or books focusing on secrets, sisters, marriages, motherhood, personal growth then I'd recommend checking out this one!

Thank you NetGalley and Random House Publishing for the digital ARC of Where the Grass is Green and The Girls are Pretty, currently scheduled for publication on Tuesday, May 18, 2021.

New Lauren Weisberger alert! She is the ultimate summer reading author for me, and I’m pleased to report that her latest was a ton of fun, with the right amount of heft and heart.

WHERE THE GRASS IS GREEN AND THE GIRLS ARE PRETTY is a take on the Varsity Blues Admissions scandal- where rich parents pay a “consultant” to put in a good word for their kid at elite universities. The story is told from the viewpoints of three women- the famous newscaster, her formerly overachieving and now stagnant sister, and the daughter whose admission to Princeton was bought.

Peyton (the mom) is very famous so when the story breaks, she gets publicly shamed. The daughter Max was a fantastic character- she felt authentic and not silly, and very aware of her privilege. I loved the relationship between the sisters, and while it starts off focusing on the things rich parents will do to give their kids a leg up, ultimately it’s a layered story of secrets, motherhood, family, marriage, and the cost of chasing perfection. This was one of my favorite Weinberger books in awhile. Even the characters behaving the worst were strangely endearing.

I loved The Devil Wears Prada and this may be my least favorite by the author. The story line was repetitive to others we've seen, the characters were extremely unlikable, and I was annoyed with what their big complaints in life are. They are all so privileged and just tough to want to read or root for.

This family drama revolves around the college admissions scandal and so is quite topical. This is a character-driven story which generally kept my attention but I didn’t really engage with the characters. It was overall a pleasant read for me. Three stars.

Thanks to Random House and Netgalley for an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

I love a book with an NYC backdrop, following the lives of rich characters. This started out no different! It hooked me at the beginning, and I was excited to see where it went. I didn't know much going into it, so was pleasantly surprised by the college admissions scandal plotline. It got to be a bit more character-driven than I prefer, though, and towards the middle I started to lose interest. I did like how everything came together in the end, and did enjoy most of the characters, especially Max! I think this would make for a great, easy summer escape read, and I would still recommend it to friends!

This was not my favorite Lauren Weisberger book. It may have been the subject (college admissions scandal) or maybe just the predictability of the book, but I did not find myself unhappy when the book ended. The characters were flat to me and I honestly just didn’t like them all that much. That being said, if you are looking for a quicker, lighter read and/or love the college admissions scandal topic,, I would definitely give it a try.

Peyton is a successful anchor of a famous morning show, living in NYC with her husband and 17 year old daughter. Until a scandal involving her husband and her daughters' admission to Princeton University shakes up their world. Not only that, but Peyton’s sister Skye, living in a fancy suburb of NYC finds that her dreams are crushed because of the scandal as well.

One lie, one bad decision shakes up the lives of many in this dramatic story. Can the family survive? And can they handle the truth?

Thank you Netgalley and Random House for my advanced reader copy!

While I am always entertained with Lauren Weisberger's books, I wasn't super interested in this one. I feel like the theme of the college scandal has been very played out this year. I usually love a rich people behaving badly book, but this one wasn't doing it for me.

Thanks you to Lauren Weisberger and Random House publishing for providing me a NetGalley.

I liked this book a lot! It follows the recent "cheating to get into college" scandal and a large family as they weather their way through a second wave of said scandal. I really liked all of the characters in this book, which is unusual for me - normally I love one or two and hate one or two, but that wasn't the case with this book. Definitely recommend if you like some NYC drama!