The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

Isadora Bentley is a research assistant whose life has not followed her plan.  She thought she was in a great relationship with Alex, but he threw her under the bus after she had done massive research for his publication.  She is now looking down the barrel of her thirtieth birthday and decides to visit Aisle 8 (the candy/junk food aisle) for her celebratory snacks.  What she was truly planning to do was to eat herself into a sugar coma.  At the checkout, she sees one of the women's magazines with an article about 31 ways to find happiness.  Isadora cannot say she is happy by any stretch of the imagination.  She wants more of her life and finds this article offensive.  As a researcher, she knows the best ways to test hypotheses.  She decides to test this one out with the goal in mind to prove the author wrong.  Along the way, she makes some new friends, she climbs out of her little shell, and she rails at the injustices of her life.  

The society we live in today has created people who are so blind to their own faults but are so willing to pick at the faults of others without looking to see if they are even accurate.  These people tear others down in order to build themselves up, and, in the meantime, create chaos and havoc wherever they go.  There are a couple of characters like that in this book.  But every book needs its dastardly villain.  

Courtney Walsh has basically thrown herself into Isadora's character and made her so realistic and believable.  Some of the other characters were not as likable, some were endearing, some were clueless. One thing I absolutely loved was the David Attenborough narration of her life.  I have a friend who says that if someone were going to narrate her life, it would have to be Samuel L. Jackson, because she needs the swear words thrown in for good measure.  This was a great addition to the book.  There were some parts of the plot that moved slower than others, but overall, this was a great read.  Four Stars. 

Thomas Nelson provided the copy I read for this review.  All opinions expressed are solely my own.