Story for the Week
Someone told me once in a TikTok comment conversation that she loves finding book recommendations in the wild. That struck me as a fantastic way to describe those books that randomly make their way onto your TBR. It was exactly how I discovered the book reviewed in this post.
Every year when I do My Book Year in (P)Review, I talk about where I find the books that I read. My primary sources include NetGalley, Amazon First Reads, and the My Book Friends Facebook group I belong to. I also get a number of recommendations from friends and colleagues. But on occasion, I happen across a conversation that gets my attention.
Back in 2018, I had never heard of Amanda Prowse. Definitely not a new author when I discovered her, she was on the verge of releasing her thirteenth novel. I still posted on Twitter back then and had only been on NetGalley for about three months. In fact, I hadn’t even started writing this blog yet. That was almost two years in the future.
But I happened to see a Twitter post talking about how excited someone was to find Prowse’s upcoming novel on NetGalley. I read the description for The Girl in the Corner and decided to request the ARC. I finished it in three days, and it ended up as one of my earlier review posts here (What’s Your Favorite [Fill in the Blank]?). This is exactly what it means to find book recommendations in the wild.
After Twitter became an initial 🙄, I switched over to Threads, which features an extremely active book community. (Not always in a good way, but I frequently take advantage of the block option.) Over the summer, I happened to see a Thread that mentioned The Wedding People. Someone said it might have been her first five-star review of the year. Some people commented that they really didn’t care for it. But one of the replies said she wasn’t prepared for how much she would enjoy it. She called it one of her top reads of the year.
I found the description intriguing, and I read some of the reviews. It sounded like something I might enjoy, so I squeezed it into my reading schedule. I ended up moving the posting date for this review, but I’m so glad I took a chance on it. Because sometimes the book recommendations we find in the wild are the best ones. 😉
Before we get to the review, back to the recent TikTok story. One of the creators I follow was talking about wanting to get back into reading. She had read five books in a row that she didn’t really care for. Someone mentioned having just finished The Wedding People and said it surprised her in every good way.
I mentioned the conversation on Threads, which led me to saying I had found Prowse on Twitter from a random tweet. That’s when she said she loves finding book recommendations in the wild. She checked her out and decided to start with…The Girl in the Corner—the very first Amanda Prowse book I read. Funny how things can come full circle like that. 🥰
To my new Librarian friend on TikTok, I hope you enjoyed The Girl in the Corner. And for all the book people on every platform, keep talking about your book recommendations. I obsessively plan out my TBR, but books like The Wedding People give me a reason to shift things around.
Book Review
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
5 Stars for The Wedding People by Alison Espach
355 pages
Publisher: Henry Holt and Co.
Publication Date: July 30, 2024
Purchased on Amazon.
Publisher’s Description
It’s a beautiful day in Newport, Rhode Island, when Phoebe Stone arrives at the grand Cornwall Inn wearing a green dress and gold heels, not a bag in sight, alone. She’s immediately mistaken by everyone in the lobby for one of the wedding people, but she’s actually the only guest at the Cornwall who isn’t here for the big event.
Phoebe is here because she’s dreamed of coming for years—she hoped to shuck oysters and take sunset sails with her husband, only now she’s here without him, at rock bottom, and determined to have one last decadent splurge on herself. Meanwhile, the bride has accounted for every detail and every possible disaster the weekend might yield except for, well, Phoebe and Phoebe’s plan—which makes it that much more surprising when the two women can’t stop confiding in each other.
In turns absurdly funny and devastatingly tender, Alison Espach’s The Wedding People is ultimately an incredibly nuanced and resonant look at the winding paths we can take to places we never imagined—and the chance encounters it sometimes takes to reroute us.
************
Main Characters:
- Phoebe – 40 years old, an adjunct professor of literature in St. Louis, divorced from Matt, spent 10 years trying to write her dissertation, she and Matt struggled with infertility, raised by her father because her mother died after she was born
- Lila – 28 years old, booked the entire Cornwall in Rhode Island for the week of her wedding to Gary, an assistant curator at an art gallery she runs with her mother
- Gary – 40 years old, a gastroenterologist, a widower with an 11-year-old daughter named Melanie
- Juice (Melanie) – 11 years old, Gary’s daughter who recently asked to be called Juice, doesn’t care for Lila
- Marla – Gary’s sister, mom to Oliver, was a lawyer until she became the mayor of her town, doesn’t really like Lila
- Jim – Gary’s best man and brother-in-law from his first marriage, Lila warns Phoebe that he hits on everyone
- Matt – a professor of philosophy, divorced from Phoebe after he got involved with their work colleague Mia who just had a child with her husband, Mia had been Phoebe’s best friend at work, the two couples often socialized together
Trigger warning: suicidal thoughts, depression, infertility
What a journey this was! I discovered Alison Espach randomly from a Threads post…and I am so glad that I did. I saw some mixed reviews about this one, but I definitely feel like this one appeals to different audiences in different ways.
The story begins with Phoebe arriving at the Cornwall Inn, where she has booked the only remaining room for a single night. Everyone assumes she is there for “the wedding of Lila and Gary” because Lila assumed she had the entire inn booked for the week. Phoebe notes how different people act for a wedding, that they’re louder than normal, everyone with a seemingly false happiness.
When Phoebe and Lila end up in an elevator together, Lila asks why Phoebe is at the hotel if she’s not part of the wedding. Phoebe tells her the truth…because she really has nothing to lose. Lila insists that Phoebe cannot go through with her plan because it would ruin her wedding week. And with Phoebe not involved in the wedding, Lila seeks her out and confides in Phoebe in a way she can’t with her own family and friends.
Lila exudes the attitude that she is and should be the center of attention and insists that Phoebe stay for the week. Phoebe realizes how much she has been a background character in her own life and becomes determined that she won’t be that person anymore. She e-mails her boss and tells him he will have to find someone to cover for her for the week and ignores calls from her ex-husband.
I loved the dichotomy of Phoebe and Lila. Phoebe lives with a lack of accomplishment and a sense of failure, and Lila almost expects the world to revolve around her. Where Phoebe is introspective, Lila basically expects people to cater to her every whim. She has money, after all. Self-involved and annoying, Lila has a massive sense of entitlement and is exactly the type of character readers love to hate.
“…my mother is convinced that I’m making a mistake marrying Gary, just like her,” Lila says.
“How do you know?”
“She tells me! When she’s really loaded at two in the afternoon, she just says these things. She’s like, Lila, you don’t have to get married just because your father’s dying wish was to see you get married. What does it matter? He’s already dead! And then she goes off about how I might want to think twice about marrying an older man in waste management like she did.”
“I thought Gary was a doctor?”
“My father owned landfills. Gary is a gastroenterologist. Totally different jobs, but my mother is just like, Like I said, they’re both in waste management. Two men, on a mission to help the country deal with their shit.”
Lila is quiet for a moment, like she is considering something deeply, perhaps the entire trajectory of her life.
“Can you imagine having a mother who talks to you like that?
“My mother is dead,” Phoebe says.
“Oh. Well, you’re lucky then. My mother, she just monologues,” Lila says, as if she were not doing the same exact thing right now.
Phoebe decides to stay the week with Lila. As much as Lila inserts herself into Phoebe’s life for the week, the two become unlikely and unusual friends. It’s a slow burn, for sure, but this story becomes an amazing adult coming-of-age story for both Phoebe and Lila. I really enjoyed getting to know both characters and seeing their stories through to the end.
Pick this one up. Whether you identify with Phoebe or Lila, there is so much to unpack here. You won’t be disappointed.
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