Jeff Bezos' Girlfriend Lauren Sanchez Is Being Sued By Her Former Yoga Teacher For Allegedly Stealing A Children's Book Idea About A Cartoon Animal That Goes To Space

Taylor Hill. Getty Images.

Safe to say we've all been there: 

You're getting your helicopter pilot's license when you look over and see a fly trapped in the cockpit. 'My God, I bet that tiny little fly never imagined he'd be getting to rest his wings while soaring at 150MPH with little old me', you muse. 'Maybe someday this fly will even find himself in outer-space with my billionaire boyfriend, Jeff Bezos. Feeling small and out of place but reaching great heights parallels my own journey with STEM, diversity, inclusion and a late dyslexia diagnosis. I should write a children's book about this fly going to space to inspire other completely normal and relatable people'. So you write the book, and all the major celebs endorse it and it gets a ton of press because you're a big name and it becomes a NYT Bestseller… BUT THEN your arch nemesis & former yoga instructor drops in to say, "Wait a second, bitch, I wrote a book about a Hindu cat who goes to Mars just last year! Your'e copying!" Truly a tale as old as time.

Via The Cut:

According to Lauren Sánchez’s former yoga teacher, the stroke of genius that led to her debut children’s book, The Fly Who Flew to Space, might not have been her own. Since announcing the project last year, Jeff Bezos’s fiancée has said her book about “a little fly … who’s flying” was inspired by (in no particular order): a fly she saw trapped in a helicopter while getting her pilot’s license, Bezos’s trip to space, her late-diagnosed dyslexia, “STEM,” “geography,” and “inclusion.”

But according to a lawsuit obtained by “Page Six,” Sánchez’s former yoga teacher Alanna Zabel claims she was the brains behind the little fly that flew, alleging that she’d divulged her children’s-book idea about a “cat who flies to Mars” to her client over the course of 16 years. Her book, Dharma Kitty Goes to Mars, was released in 2021, and is currently available on Amazon, of all places, for $16.95.

Via the lawsuit, 

Zabel hosted private yoga lessons for Sánchez between 2007 and 2011. Over a period of 16 years, the instructor claims the duo had numerous “oral and written discussions” about her feline-astronaut concept and that she’d even gone as far as attempting to contact Bezos about “giving proceeds of sales from the book to Bezos Earth Fund and Bezos Academy.” Zabel, who wrote the complaint herself in lieu of legal representation, added that she had trusted Sánchez with her “intellectual property” despite her “continual and outrageous acts of jealousy.”

I have a hard time believing that a woman deeply enmeshed with one of the wealthiest men in the entire world who seems to be living out her wildest dreams every day is jealous of a former yoga instructor, but I'll be damned…

Yes the similarities are glaring, especially considering the two authors spent time together over many years and allegedly shared ideas, but I don't think Zabel really has a case against Sanchez. If you google "Children's Book + goes to space" the results will provide no less than 10,000 other books about cartoon animals going to space. Also, I read the full premise of both so you don't have to, and they're very different despite both being bad. (Random this made me remember that when Mantis was still here some other comedian went nuts because Mantis was doing 'man-on-the-street referee' bits, and he said it was his idea & Mantis was copying. Out of curiosity I looked up some key words on YouTube and like 50 other comedians had been doing the same bit well before either of them. This kind of stuff happens all the time.)

Anyways, for anyone still reading this who th… oh … oh my God… 

Looks like the REAL beef here should be between Andrew Waterhouse and Sanchez, because his 2023 book is all about - that's right - another fly exploring outer space. My goodness. The plot thickens. Glad I spent some time that I'll never get back looking into all this today ha ha! However this turns out I'm sure the allegations alone have ruined Sanchez's experience with the book and she'll never recover. 

If you made it all the way to the end please comment, "What did I just read" and have a great Friday.