Top Ten Tuesday: Here Comes the Bride

Top Ten Tuesday is weekly meme created by the lovely folks at The Broke and the Bookish. They created it because they're "particularly fond of lists" and since I also enjoy lists, I've decided to participate in this fun feature.

This week's Top Ten Tuesday has us listing our favourite books with a certain setting. My first thought was to do a geographical location and pick Canada but then I realized I could have a little more fun and make my list more abstract. I decided to list ten of my favourite books that feature weddings! It is wedding season, after all. (Seriously...is everyone else's Facebook timeline exploding with wedding pictures and engagement announcements right now? Or is it just me because I'm 26 and at the age where everyone is getting married?). Anywho. I picked these ten books because I've read them (there are obviously many others out there). I've reviewed almost all of them so the links lead to my reviews. Did I miss any of your favourites?

Don't forget to check out their blog for a full list of everyone participating this week!

Bride Quartet - Nora Roberts
This is probably my favourite all about weddings book. I loved loved loved this series. It was sweet and fun and I loved reading about the four friends that planned weddings. And the covers are gorgeous, too!

Wedding Season - Katie Fforde
I adored this book that features a wedding planner.

Nearlyweds - Beth Kendrick
I loved this book about three couples that weren't technically married. Talk about a paperwork screw up!

Chose the Wrong Guy, Gave Him the Wrong Finger - Beth Harbison
This is another one where the main character doesn't actually get married but she does work in a wedding dress shop and designs and creates dresses. And she does attend a wedding at the end.

When Girlfriends Chase Dreams - Savannah Page
I love the When Girlfriends... series and I liked reading about Claire and was happy she was finally getting married.

Crazy Rich Asians - Kevin Kwan
Anyone who knows this book is probably wondering why I put it on the list. The wedding isn't really the main point of the story but it is the reason Nick brings his girlfriend Rachel to Singapore. Plus the wedding (and bachelor/bachelorette parties) are so ridiculously extravagant that it's so much fun to read about. Amazing novel.

Arranged - Catherine McKenzie
One of my favourite books ever, Arranged takes a different look at a wedding as the main character ends up using an arranged marriage service. This is a fabulous novel that I highly recommend.

All At Sea - Heather Wardell
In this novel, the main characters are to marry on a cruise ship after only a few months of dating. But what happens when the bride to be has already dated the groom's brothers?

Wedding Night - Sophie Kinsella
Imagine getting married and then having anything and everything go wrong so you can't enjoy your wedding night to the full extent? I'm sure that would be quite frustrating. This novel is classic Kinsella and so much funny ridiculousness ensues.

The Wedding Beat - Devan Sipher
I'm sure you're familiar with the movie 27 Dresses, yes? So you know the character played by James Marsden, The New York Times wedding beat reporter. Turns out he's based on a real guy - Devan Sipher. This novel is loosely based on his experiences and follows a wedding reporter on his various adventures.

July Chick Lit Review: Wedding Season

No, you're not experiencing déjà vu. This is a different book from last month's review, just with the same title! However, I was incredibly upset and confused when I realized...I had already read this book! What the heck? I've been trying to figure out when or why I would have read it before now and just can't do it. I therefore must conclude that I've lost my mind :) That's the only reasonable explanation, obviously.

I know it probably seems like a bad thing that I read a book and didn't remember it, but I did enjoy this book. I must say though that I liked last month's Wedding Season more than this month's but they had completely different takes on weddings. Last month the book focused on a wedding planner (a job that I can't decide if I would love or not) who had two weddings to plan on the same day, one of which was her sister's. This month the novel was about a woman who had to attend or be in seventeen weddings in six months. Can you imagine??? I think I would go nuts...not only the stress of being in a ton of weddings and making decisions but all the money...oh boy. Two weddings in one summer was enough for me.

Now, I will give you the synopsis from Goodreads...

Seventeen weddings. Six months. Only the strong survive.

Joy Silverman and her boyfriend, Gabriel Winslow, seem perfect for each other. Living together in New York City, they have everything they want and everything in common--most important, that neither one wants to get married. Ever.

But when Joy finds herself obligated to attend seventeen weddings in six months (including those of her father, mother, younger brother, and five of her closest girlfriends), the couple is forced to take a new look at why they're so opposed to marriage when the rest of the world can't wait to walk down the aisle. As the season heats up and the pressure mounts, Joy must confront what it means -- and what it costs -- to be true to one's self.

A witty, wicked comedy of manners in the satirical tradition of Jane Austen and Evelyn Waugh, Wedding Season is an intelligent, laugh-out-loud funny examination of friendship, faith, integrity, and the ideas and institutions that bind us together, shape our lives, and define who we are.

The synopsis mentions one of things that I wanted to comment on...this novel has a very Jane Austen type feel to it. It's hard to really describe but it really is a "comedy of manners" that the cover says it is. Joy is also very clever and critical of her society's norms - which is quite similar to Elizabeth Bennet from Austen's Pride and Prejudice. Joy can't understand why her friends all want to get married. She doesn't see the point if you can be just as happy without that piece of paper. Elizabeth can't understand why her friends would marry just to marry and be secure. She wants to marry someone she loves and respects. (Imagine not having that choice? It seems like such a no brainer now but women didn't always have that choice.) Can anyone else see the similarities or am I stretching with the comparison?

The book isn't very character driven which I didn't love. Ironically, there were a ton characters so I think I just didn't get a good sense of any of them. I actually found myself pretending that some characters didn't exist. Is that wrong? They just didn't add anything to the story and they bothered me. The last few books that I've read had main characters that were just so vivacious and likable and I found it hard to really connect with Joy. She was so set in her ways that marriage was evil and everyone who got married was stupid that it bothered me. Also, she had suspicions that her boyfriend was fooling around with another woman but didn't approach him about it. It was also obvious that he wasn't doing anything, at least it was to me. But maybe that was because I had already read the book... :)

The ending of this novel is a little surprising because it's not a typical happily ever after. I loved that, once I got over the fact that things weren't all wrapped up in a pretty little package. Even though things don't seem to be "perfect" at the end, Joy grew as a person and I think that's the most important thing.

Overall, I liked the book but I didn't love it. It's clever and real and has quite a few laugh out loud moments. (Joy's aunt's bachelorette party is pretty amusing). Has anyone else read this one? What did you think of it? I wish I liked it more, but you can't love everything! I would still recommend this novel for a fun summer read - it is wedding season after all!

Happy reading :)

June Chick Lit Review: Wedding Season

Ah, wedding season. While I have not had too many weddings to worry about yet I know the time is coming when I will have quite a few to attend in one year. I've already been in two weddings in one summer (sidenote: my profile picture is from my boyfriend's brother's wedding) and, let me tell you, it is not a very fun experience. Especially when you're unable to find a job right after graduating university. Woohoo! But I digress. This post is actually all about the wonderful novel Wedding Season by Katie Fforde that I read for my June Chick Lit Challenge Review. (Another fun sidenote: this was the last purchase I made with my discount at the bookstore!)

Let's start off with the synopsis from Goodreads:

Sarah is a wedding planner hiding a rather inconvenient truth—she doesn’t believe in love. But as the confetti flutters away on the June breeze of yet another successful wedding season she finds herself agreeing to organize two more events, on the same day, and only two months away. And while her celebrity bride is all sweetness and light, the other bride, Sarah’s own sister, quickly starts driving her crazy with her high expectations and very limited budget. Luckily, Sarah is aided in her seemingly impossible task by two best friends, Elsa, an accomplished dress designer, and Bron, a multitalented hairdresser. All three are very good at their jobs, but romance doesn’t feature very prominently in any of their lives. As the big day draws near, every moment is spent preparing for the weddings, and they certainly haven’t got any time to even think about love; or have they?

 I don't think this synopsis does the book justice quite honestly. It's about so much more than Sarah and the two weddings she is planning. Elsa and Bron each have a story to tell too. I loved this book, and not only because it featured a wedding planner (more on that later).

While the story does focus on Sarah, I appreciated that Fforde allowed for development of both Elsa and Bron. It seemed so natural for the three of them to become close friends as well as having a working relationship. The three women all have a somewhat negative view on love and relationships. Sarah is completely cynical and has given up on finding someone. Elsa is so shy and quiet and she doesn't really think she deserves a relationship. Bron is with a man who doesn't appreciate her and she's struggling to find herself again. I think Elsa was my favourite of the three and I think it's because she has the best "growth" story. I liked how each woman changed for the better and also, how she helped the other two evolve.

As I mentioned earlier, I really liked that this novel was all about planning weddings. Give me a book, tv show, or movie that is about wedding planning and I am one happy girl. It's not because I'm obsessed with planning a wedding for myself (thinking about getting married right now freaks me out, quite honestly) but because I enjoy planning events and think that weddings would be so much fun. Yes, I know it would be unbelievably stressful and brides are not always the best to deal with (I mentioned weddings are stressful, yes?) but they're the kind of events that have a lot of love, a purpose, and one hell of an awesome party. One major downside (and quite possibly the reason I haven't pursued wedding planning as a career): working weekends!

This is the kind of book that you know going into it that the main character(s) will end up with a man. And that's ok. I don't mind that chick lit books usually follow a typical formula, as long as the author does something new and fun with it. Fforde did that. When all the men were introduced, I knew which one ended up with each woman but I had no idea how they were eventually going to get together. That's what made this novel fresh - the common chick lit devices were used but Fforde put her own twist on it.

I highly recommend this novel - especially for a summer read. Anyone who has been in, attended, or planned a wedding will see the humour in it and will be able to identify with the story. Everyone else will enjoy it just as much as there is so much else going on outside the weddings. A quick check on Goodreads and I can see that Katie Fforde has many other novels. I think I'll have to find room for a few more of hers on my to-read pile! Happy reading :)