Book Review: “Lucky Bitch” by Denise Duffield-Thomas

“Lucky Bitch” by Denise Duffield-Thomas is a self-improvement book that will leave you feeling positive and energetic. At the end of the book, you’ll want to instantly pull out your journal and dive into forgiving your past, figuring out how to manifest your “luck,” and creating the life you’ve always dreamed of.

This self-improvement book focuses on manifestation: aligning your body and mind towards your goals. Sometimes manifestation gets a bad rap as a bit “woo-woo,” but Denise is nothing if not practical. A great read for entrepreneurs, women, and anyone ready to harness their own “luck”!

Book Summary

Denise tells the story of how she turned around her boring, dead-end life by winning a contest to become a honeymoon tester with her husband, Mark. You might be thinking: “that lucky bitch!”—which is exactly what all her friends thought, too. However, the real story is a bit more complicated. 

Denise didn’t win her free trip around the world through sheer luck. She worked hard and threw all of her efforts into finding a way to travel. Traveling was her big dream, and she was determined to find a way to realize that dream.

Denise preaches believing in yourself totally and completely. She begins with an explanation of how she won the competition and then goes in-depth about how to manifest amazing opportunities in your life. She then gives all her best manifestation tips, dives deep into how to create your own “lucky” business, and helps the reader find self-love. 

Her story is not only inspirational, she makes it sound totally achievable!

The Cast of Characters

Denise Duffield-Thomas 

Denise is a coach, writer, and millionaire who manifested all her own “luck.” Reading her story, you can’t help but fall in love with the enthusiasm that radiates through her words. 

Yes, she had a less-than-ideal childhood. Yes, she’s not “perfectly” thin and traditionally beautiful. Yes, she made a lot of mistakes along the way. But Denise has built a life most people only dream of—and she did it all on her own. 

The Reader

As with most self-improvement books, the reader is just as important as the author. Denise encourages readers to pick up their own journal and pen and write about their issues, roadblocks, dreams, and goals. As you read, you’ll find yourself taking part in the author’s story, following along as she helps you work through your own past, failures, and hopes for the future. 

Important Themes

Theme 1: How Denise Became a Professional Honeymoon Tester

The most unique thing about Denise Duffield-Thomas’s journey is that she actually won an international competition to become a professional honeymoon tester. Hundreds of couples entered the competition to get paid to travel all over the world. Yet, Denise and her husband won. Crazy!

How did they do it? Was it just a matter of wishing really hard? 

Nope, not at all. There was actually quite a lot of work put into winning the contest! Denise breaks down exactly what she and her husband did to snatch the coveted position. 

Theme 2: The Ten Lucky Bitch Commandments

Denise outlines ten major tenants of becoming a “Lucky Bee.” These commandments can be applied to any area of your life where you want to see improvement. 

Denise includes tips such as forgiveness, gratitude, and treating yourself like a VIP. Once you start implementing the “Lucky Bee” commandments, you’ll invite the Universe to start sending you more wonderful experiences. 

Theme 3: Your Lucky Biz

Denise dedicates a whole chapter to creating your lucky business. Worried about what kind of business you should go into? She’s got you covered.

There are so many different ways to create a business. Denise provides a bunch of tips to help you discover your true calling so you can stop working for companies that make you feel drained and unappreciated.

Theme 4: Abundantly Lucky (Get Rich, Lucky Bitch!)

Money: everyone wants more of it. 

And yet, why do so many of us struggle to become rich? Denise explains that most of us have “money blocks.” Money blocks are preconceived negative emotions towards money. 

For example, you might feel that becoming rich will make you a meaner person. Or you might secretly think becoming rich will mean you won’t have time for your family. Or that your partner will leave you. Or that your friends will hate you. Or that you have to always work hard in order to “deserve” money.

On the surface, these seem a little ridiculous. Of course, I don’t believe those things! I’m ready for more money!

But, if we’re honest with ourselves, many of us harbor these secret fears and hesitations about money and they subconsciously hold us back. Denise helps us move past those fears and start letting the Universe know that we’re ready for more cash flow. 

Theme 5: Self-Love Will Change Your Fortune

Denise’s final chapter focuses on self-love and self-care. She spends a good amount of time describing her own journey with her body. Having struggled a long time with her weight, she eventually learned how to love herself despite her flaws and forgive her body. 

Through forgiveness, Denise was able to get to comfortable body weight and, more importantly, stop hating herself and start loving her life!

Favorite Quotes

Quote 1

“You have to practice radical, unrelenting, uncompromising gratitude, no matter what – and if you can’t find something to be grateful for, you’re not trying hard enough. That sounds harsh, but what’s the alternative? Do you want your situation to change or not? You can wait for the Universe to do it for you; or you can take the quickest, easiest route, and take responsibility for your feelings.”

(92)

I love this quote! I absolutely agree that when it comes to having a life you’re proud of, you have to practice radical gratitude. 

We become entangled in our own problems so easily, it’s vital that we practice gratitude regularly in order to encourage more good things to come to us. Focusing on negativity will only bring more negativity into our lives!

Because, frankly, why not? If it works, great! If it doesn’t work, what harm did it do?

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Quote 2

“Extreme perfectionism is self-hatred in disguise; and it only serves to make us feel bad about ourselves. High-achieving women, in particular, can get caught up in wanting everything done right…”

(113)

This quote seriously resonates with me. 

Have you ever put down “perfectionist” on your resume, hoping it will make you sound competent and hard-working? I have! 

But the truth is, I’ve never actually been a perfectionist. Instead, I’ve always been more of a big-picture kind of gal. And that’s actually a good thing! Perfection is truly the enemy of excellence. 

I also believe that perfectionism causes toxic patterns that hold you down from real, meaningful success. I’ve known many people, not just women, who tear themselves apart when they don’t deliver perfection. That kind of unhealthy thinking will only make things worse because you’ll never truly appreciate your success. 

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Quote 3

“So many people believe that work isn’t meant to be fun; and this assumption often crosses over into entrepreneurial life, too.”

(134)

Oh man, ain’t that the truth!

How often have we heard “life sucks and then you die”? But it doesn’t have to be that way! And making money doesn’t have to be that way, either. We don’t have to do grueling labor from dawn till dusk to make a living. In fact, some of the richest people in the world are the ones who do the least amount of work! 

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Quote 4

“It’s okay to choose ease and flow in your business, so choose the path of least resistance, even if it feels like ‘cheating.’”

(154)

Sometimes, when I get a “lucky break,” I feel like I cheated. I tell myself I don’t deserve the money I earned because I didn’t put in 150% effort. I tell myself I don’t deserve to celebrate because it came too easily. 

That’s total BS! We should embrace ease. We should embrace taking shortcuts. Why spend unnecessary time on something when we could get it done faster and better if we did it the “easy” way? Being able to find those paths of least resistance is an art form in itself—so celebrate!

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Quote 5

“My final message to you is…Why not you? Why not now?”

(219)

One of the last lines of the book, and perhaps the most powerful, Denise asks the reader directly “why not?” The truth is, there is no good reason to not start improving your life right now. There is no good reason not to become rich, to become more successful, to become happier. 

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Who Should Read It?

“Lucky Bitch” is a book for women who are dissatisfied in their careers and lives. It’s a book for female entrepreneurs struggling to create a profitable business they love. 

It’s a book for women with unhealthy relationships with money. It’s a book for women who feel like they’ll never be good enough. It’s a book for anyone that is trying to improve their life and start feeling a little more like a “lucky bitch.”

Any Adult Elements?

Besides a few curse words (notably “bitch”), this book is family-friendly. However, I doubt that young audiences would find it useful. It’s certainly geared towards adults because it focuses on overcoming childhood blocks, career or money issues, and other “adult” topics. 

Final Thoughts

Although I appreciated a lot of Denise’s advice, of the self-help and self-improvement books I’ve read, this one actually didn’t make as much of an impact on me. I found the prose to be a little bland and the message a little repetitive. 

That said, I think my issue with this book simply stems from the problem that I don’t identify with a lot of the hardships Denise went through. I haven’t personally struggled with some of the problems she explicitly addressed. This made it hard for me to really love the book because I wanted to feel intimately connected to the author. 

Despite my personal reservations about “Lucky Bitch,” Denise has a treasure trove of great things to say, and her story is truly inspiring. I enjoy her incredible passion and gusto that boosted my own mood on more than one occasion. Her writing is incredibly clear and easy to understand. If you’re new to the self-help world, “Lucky Bitch” is a great place to start!

Author Bio

Grace Claman is a freelance writer from Kansas living in sunny L.A. where she is staggered by the size of the ocean and thinks palm trees look like cartoons. 

Grace is best known for her blog on Medium where she’s been published in popular publications such as The Writing Cooperative, The Ascent, and The Post-Grad Survival Guide. 

Besides helping businesses with their online marketing, Grace enjoys speaking horribly broken Italian, reading fantasy novels, and swing dancing. She is currently rediscovering the magic that is Instagram and spends entirely too much time on it.