Living Oprah

Living Oprah: My One-Year Experiment to Walk the Walk of the Queen of Talk by Robyn Okrant

Another formulaic memoir with potential that failed to excite me in any way. Okrant decides to live for one year as Oprah advises in her magazine, on her web site, and of course on her TV show to see what it's like to live "your best life" (a term Oprah likes to use). Each chapter is a month of 2008 and includes a tally of the time and monetary costs of everything she does (i.e. purchasing the magazine, buying products the Queen of Talk endorses on the show, etc) which is interesting to see, but the commentary on the month is really not interesting. Okrant is a yoga teacher in grad school with a loving husband and close friendships so it would seem she's already living a good life and (I don't want to spoil anything so I'll remain mum) we see rather or not following Oprah's advice really enhances her life. I think I was really hoping to hear more of Oprah's advice and what worked, but she doesn't really talk a whole lot about how the advice helps her believe it or not. It's more just about how it consumes her life. Eh, it's interesting to try something new for a year, but following Oprah's advice didn't really seem all that interesting by Okrant's account.