Smile and Look Pretty by Amanda Pellegrino is a mystery thriller that takes your breath away. A well-written, refreshing and timely drama that pulls you in from the beginning and holds your attention with all the unexpected twists and turns.

I wasn't 100% sure what this book was about and whether I would enjoy it, but as I got into it I liked it. The book starts with Cate who has just landed her dream job as an assistant at a great publishing company. Of course, her dreams aren't all they are cracked up to be. The same as her friends are all in careers, they thought would be great stepping stones. On a whim one day at one of their weekly complaining sessions, Cate suggests writing a blog called Twentysomethings. Cate, Max, and Olivia are keen on their idea but Lauren who is the wannabe scriptwriter is worried that this could reflect badly for them and could jeopardize their jobs. As the book goes along and the website begins, the stories start to roll in and the submissions start to rise from females in the industries who have had bad bosses and feel like crap. Soon the website will become viral and what started as an idea will become a revolution for all women in the industry. Smile and Look Pretty by Amanda Pellegrino was a good read for this particular time as it focuses heavily on the #MeToo movement. As a blogger, I also loved the idea that the girls started a website to talk about their issues and the fact it went viral as this is a writer's dream. If you are wanting an amazing feminist novel that everyone should read then Smile and Look Pretty by Amanda Pellegrino is the read for you as it is relevant to today's society.

Girl Power in the workforce, but with girls as assisstants in faily glamourous jobs, that is Smile and Look Pretty in a nutshell. I've seen this book being compaired to Gossip Girl, and I don't really see that. It takes a pretty hefty topic and makes a light feeling book out of it.

This book was very middle-of-the-road for me. For the most part I didn't love it, but didn't hate it.

My biggest complaints are things that would be resolved if this were adapted for the screen: I was probably about a third of the way into the book before I could finally start to make distinctions between the main characters and remember who was working for which awful boss. The pacing/formatting seemed a little odd (but perhaps some of that could be a result of a digital review copy?); there was rarely any indication when perspective between characters/settings had changed, and it was often unclear if a short amount of time had passed, or several days, between key events.

Smile and Look Pretty by Amanda Pellegrino is a timely story about four women in the workplace who start an anonymous blog where they can discuss their awful experiences working for these horrible men in the entertainment industry. Other people begin to come forward to share their experiences and before long, this whole thing has grown into something huge. This book would make such a good tv series!

SYNOPSIS:

Best friends Cate, Lauren, Olivia and Max are overworked and underpaid assistants to some of the most powerful people in the entertainment industries. Like the assistants who came before them, the women know they have to pay their dues and abide the demeaning tasks and verbal abuse from their bosses in order to climb the ladders to their dream jobs.

But as they are passed over for promotions and the toxic office environments reach a breaking point, the women secretly start an anonymous blog detailing their experiences, which snowballs into hundreds of others coming forward with stories of their own. Confronted with newfound viral fame and the possibility of their identities being revealed, the assistants have to contend with the life-changing consequences of speaking out against those who refuse to share the power.

An entertaining and easy read that deals with a very serious topic, toxic work environment, in a creative and entertaining way.
I liked the characters and the plot kept me reading and hooked.
Recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine

Cate, Lauren, Olivia, and Max are best friends who also work as assistants. They’re overworked, underpaid, and undervalued. They each have a terrible boss, and they’re getting very sick of the toxic behavior they have to put up with.
When Cate is pushed too far, she has the brilliant idea to start an anonymous blog where they can discuss their experiences in the workplace and how sleazy their bosses are.
The blog quickly goes viral, and other anonymous women start submitting their stories. When the women get wind that someone is trying to find out their true identities, they are instantly worried about the ramifications of what they created…unless they can find a way to own their narrative and bring down the bad guys.
This is a refreshing and timely drama, written expertly by debut author Amanda Pellegrino. The complex friendship between the four leads really shines, as does each of their workplace situations. Not to be missed

*Special thanks to NetGalley and Park Row for an early copy of this e-arc.*

Cate, Lauren, Olivia, and Max band together to turn the tables on their employers in this entertaining novel of women in the workplace. I'll bet I'm not the only one who recognized some of what they are dealing with as 20-something assistants to powerful people. It's a little challenging at first to keep the specifics of each of their situations straight in the beginning but that didn't matter for long, especially once they started their blog. Oh the blog! These four, using psuedonyms, create a blog which gains a big audience-more than they expected-of other young women who share their own thoughts. It's not easy to storm the ramparts, though, and they have to deal with the impact of what they've done. I found myself rooting for them all along the way. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. A good read.

I enjoyed this title, captivated by the actions these four brave women took to share their stories and speak out against abuse in their industries - acting, screenwriting, publishing and producing network TV. I think this title will be very relatable to early professions hoping to break into those fields, even working women everywhere.

I was drawn to this title to see how it paid homage to the #MeToo movement and I do think the author did it justice. Each character was unique but they shared a common thread: knowing they were better than the treatment they were receiving. Having the courage to put themselves out there, first anonymously then with their names in the byline, is something we can all aspire to.

I did feel the ending was a little rushed and I would have liked a follow up chapter to see how things shook out for them beyond the day they went public.

Smile and Look Pretty tells the story of four assistants in New York City, struggling to survive their terrible work environments. But it's also the story of many more women, women forced to "pay their way" to get the jobs they want, to endure harassment, to give up their entire personal lives and be available at the beck and call of their bosses. With Smile and Look Pretty, Amanda Pellegrino depicts an accurate portrait of the entertainment and corporate worlds, through a cutting but imperfect lens. While the stories of Olivia, Max, Lauren, and Cate are utterly believable, the details of their rise (and boss' fall) feels a little manufactured. The book should have been either more fun, or taken a more serious, dark tone. Overall, it's an interesting read that will hit home for many women.

I really liked the idea of this book.

I think there are some readers out there who are going to go absolutely bonkers for it. It uses, “Me, too” and general workplace woe ideals to try and bring down the people who caused the trauma.

However, I did not really enjoy it. I know it’s a work of fiction, but I assume the author was going for realistic fiction. I just didn’t buy it. It seemed juvenile and silly, really. It felt like a young adult novel trying to take on grown up problems - and it didn’t work for me.

It was also really difficult to separate and keep the characters straight. They all have essentially the same job - so trying to remember which one was which was rough for me (not to mention the cast of characters each one of them works with).

I liked the ending and thought it was a good way to wrap up the story.

I was hoping for more from this book. Instead, it was a lot of cliches and patterns that have been addressed in books, movies, and TVs. When tackling an issue like Me Too, you want to find an angle that is interesting and presents a new view or light. Instead, I was able to predict and call a lot that was going to happen. It was like Gossip Girl meets The Morning Show.

However, that being said, I would've loved this if I read it in college. The characters were people that I enjoyed enough and the pacing was decent. It was definitely an easy read, even with the subject matter being something heavier. I'm not sure I'll do a lot of recommending this book, as I think others do it better, but it didn't feel like something that wasn't worth my time. Overall, a fine book, just nothing to write home about.

Four executive assistants have been meeting for drinks and sharing stories for a long time until one comes up with an idea where they create a website where they can share their stories with the internet and it easily spirals out of control!

As an executive assistant I debated about reading this one, would it hit too close to home OR would it be entertaining reading about women in my profession and seeing their stories! It was both! I read this on a weekend when my job was quiet and it felt fun to see some fictionalized horror stories that I know are not blown too far out of proportion! There were a few moments that really made me giggle because they weren't far from experiences I had and I wanted to join these ladies at a happy hour to swap stories.

I would absolutely recommend this book, whether you are an EA OR you have an EA in your life. I think many people don't know what the EA role can and does entail, so to see the spectrum through these ladies and other's eyes, I think would be enlightening to many.

I loved this debut and hope that Amanda has many more to come, even if they aren't in the same vain.

Such an important, riveting, and fun read. It started off lighter -- women dealing with demanding and rude bosses -- but quickly turned into a more serious read about how victims of workplace sexual harassment and assault have been silenced by powerful men.

"'Why do girls always insist on going to the bathroom together, anyways?' 'Because we're plotting against the patriarchy.'"

What a strong female empowerment novel! Amanda Pellegrino did a great job highlighting the many unfair obstacles women often face in the workplace that men don't. I love how she called attention to women being categorized as emotional while men are just passionate and how a woman can be called a b*tch but a man will just be called opinionated.

While I enjoyed this book for the most part, it felt a little too chaotic at times for me. It took me a while to be able to differentiate between the four girls and their equally terrible bosses.

Best friends Cate, Lauren, Olivia and Max are overworked and underpaid assistants to some of the most powerful people in the entertainment industries. Like the assistants who came before them, the women know they have to pay their dues and abide the demeaning tasks and verbal abuse from their bosses in order to climb the ladders to their dream jobs.

OK - this premise seemed super promising! However, the execution fell a bit flat. At some point, I questioned whether or not I should finish this book - and that's not a great sign. Overall, I give it 2.5 stars for trying.

Four best friends, all with jobs as assistants to bosses who really are horrid. While they meet to gripe about them it just doesn’t seem enough.

Cate decides to write a blog where they can anonymously tell stories about these bosses and they all jump in. With help from Lauren, Olivia, and Max, these women are fed up and not going to take it anymore. They are all talented in their fields but keep getting looked over for promotion or have to put up with some pretty rough things because they are women.

But soon the blog catches fire. It seems the network of assistants and others are also fed up and are willing to name names.

Soon the New York Times runs a story on the blog and before long they have some hard decisions to make. And boy do they ever make them! Taking their lives and futures into their own hands and exposing the worst of the worst.

I read this so fast! Having once been an assistant I can say it wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. Babysitting his house while he was on vacation, meaning finding care for my child. Picking up laundry and even sending flowers to his wife and girlfriends on holidays. So I was all in with this book.

I loved every one of these brave women and hope you will too.

NetGalley/ March 8th, 2022 by Park Row

http://www.piratepatty.com

I don’t know that I’ve ever read a book as fast as Smile and Look Pretty, it just grabbed me and took me along for the most satisfying ride of workplace revenge and gratification EVER!!! This is typically not my normal read, which is why I wanted to give it a try. I absolutely loved everything about this book. The characters are very relatable and “normal”, that I felt among friends. Their struggles as women in the professional world are more real than I care to admit. While I’ve never experienced the extreme treatment they have, I’ve seen it and heard of it. This was a call to action, a vision of revolution and hope for women in the workplace. I truly feel every young twenty something woman, or younger or thirty something (that’s me!) should read this book. It is the most real work of fiction I’ve ever read, and it is a true MASTERPIECE!!!!

One of the best books I have read this year. A story that any twentysomething female will relate to and connect with. I love the honesty and the friendship between these girls. I will be encouraging all my friends to read this book.

An extremely important read that was also enjoyable. I hate to say this was a “timely” read because workplace harassment, sexist and toxic environments are not a new concept, however it would be ignorant to not point out that blogs, social networks and other online tools over the past few years have been a huge contributor in people (particularly young women) sharing their stories. In that way, this book should really be appreciated in the time in is releasing. I was able to relate to several aspects of this book (unfortunately) and thought overall it was executed well. The stories were not “over the top” or overly dramatic, more so matter of fact and really identifiable. I appreciated that the novel provided an optimistic and empowering example of females working together.
This is a must-read and I hope the importance of this story gets the exposure it deserves.

Thank you HARLEQUIN – Trade Publishing (U.S. & Canada) for the chance to read this ARC prior to release!