Wedding Books

Fast Track Photographer is the one book you should read if you read any. Dane Sander did an amazing job, and this book will certainly help many photographers, beginners and seasoned veterans alike. Don't even think twice, get it you won't regret it! :)

Fast Track Photographer is an incredible book! One of the things that Dane is incredible at is helping you focus on the positive. We all have areas in our lives we need or want to improve. Fast Track Photographer helps you take your strengths and focus on those to increase your value as a photographer.

If you are even toying with the idea of becoming a wedding photographer...read this book!

Beware: Reading this book before bed will keep you up all night!!!
It is a must read for anyone who is starting out, burning out or in the middle!!! Thank you,Dane!!!!!
Hotly and Highly Recommended!

I just finished "Fast Track Photographer" this week - I didn't realize how much this book would change the way I saw both my business and myself. I gained so much out of it, and I'm still learning to apply the principles learned from my PDNA results. I can't wait to see how things look next year at this time!

So, I just wanted to let you know, that $25 has been the best investment I've spent this year on building my business. Truly transformational.

This book is not only for the aspiring photographer but also for anyone wanting to build a business with their own uniqueness in mind. Dane's writing style is inviting and engaging. I'm not one who typically likes to read, but Dane kept my attention from beginning to end!

I, like many brides am on a tight budget and I do not feel this book gave a lot of insight on cutting costs other than to have less guests and to use silk flowers. It is a good refrence though for things to make sure to have lined up for your wedding and to give an idea of the type of person to assign certain jobs to in your wedding.

This is a pretty good book. It gives you a few good ideas you may not have thought of.

I found the book to be easy to read. The information was very practical and concise. There were loads of ideas on wedding preparation.

This is a terrific book that brings a wedding from the "vision" of what a bride may want and matches it to the financial reality of hosting a major party. It makes you really think about the things that are important to you about your wedding - and how much that is going to affect your overall budget. Most of us don't have an endless supply of money to spend on a wedding and reception, but even if you do this book is a great guide to helping you prioritize what really matters to you.

I can't imagine trying to plan a wedding on a tight budget without some type of guide book, and this is the one for me! SO many great ideas, easy to read, time-lines, do' & don'ts....I say this book is indispensible!!

I just got engaged and thought this was the perfect gift to give to my bridesmaids when asking them to be part of my special day. The book gives the girls information about their "typical" duties, gives them tips, and fun ideas, all while being both informative and humorous. Overall I thought it was a cute little book for them to read through if they wanted and something to get them all in the wedding mood :)

Although this is not the end-all etiquette manual (that would be by Emily Post) it is a cute little gift for your favorite girls.

How to Give Them a Nudge, Not a Shove:
I sent one to each of my bridesmaids and maid of honor and kept a copy for myself. Rather than insulting my best friends - ("Here. You need some help for MY wedding.") - I sent fabric covered memory boxes in my wedding colors filled with goodies: local letterpressed notecards with plenty of tear-jerking heartfelt sentiments, fabric swatches for the girls and their dates, a list of important contacts, and purse-sized leather journals in my wedding colors to go with The Bridesmaid Guide. I wrapped and packaged them by hand, and everything arrived in tact.
They were awed. They were ecstatic. They were moved to tears. All of 'em.

What Makes This Book Different:
I loved the size, color and graphic design of this book. It is adorable. It is the friendliest, most informal way to introduce your bridesmaids to a simple set of social rules. It just feels fun!

Buyer Be Aware:
I checked out The Guide in person at a local bookseller, so I knew what I was getting myself into. Make sure you utilize the Search Inside feature on Amazon. If you are looking for the etiquette encyclopedia, I highly suggest Emily Post's Wedding Etiquette. It has everything, but it's in a huge reference manual format, not in a hip and girly guide format. As long as the bride (and her mum) has her serious-people etiquette book at home, this relaxed little charmer will provide a solid foundation for your maids.

Did You Say Creative?
The book is worth it's price just for the party ideas! I won't spoil the fun, but there are more ideas in this book than a girl can use in one wedding! There is something for everyone - wild and crazy ideas, youthful ideas, and my personal favorite, clean and proper ideas - for everything from showers (even if you don't want them to be centered around gifts) and the more innocent variety of "bachelorette" parties, both events of which I did not want to partake for fear of anyone doing anything in bad taste!
This book has helped quite a bit in ironing out some of my tastes and ideas for my girls. Let's just say it has communicated on my behalf and inspired some of my wildest girlfriends with ways to leave their mark in a setting I can enjoy!

Useful:
One of my bridesmaids was a maid of honor for another friend of hers this past weekend and was able to use a lot of the information this book provided. In fact, the wedding coordinator herself was impressed by my bridesmaid's knowledge! And when speaking with my maid this afternoon about veils, SHE told ME the veil I was referring to was called a blusher!
This little guide is an investment that has already paid off, and I've still got a year till the big day!

Being a first-time bridesmaid (for my best friend's wedding in October), I am thrilled and at the same time I want to make sure I have all the important information that I need to know. While this book offers some broad strokes on bridesmaiding, I found a lot of the information to be impractical. It tends to assume that there are many maids in the party (I am one of only three) and it places emphasis on themes and games - both of which don't apply to a lot of today's less traditional brides. I feel like it needs an update to become more useful.

I thought this book was cute... really CUTE. There are others that are smart and others that are funny, this was cute and a decent choice for my little sister who is going to be my Maid of Honor. It talks down to you a little and it's very "girly" but it's quite fun and my sister enjoys it.

A fantastic gift for the new bridesmaids and maid-of-honors! It really set the relaxed and fun tone for my bridesmaids. Even if someone has been one before I'm sure they would have fun thumbing through this book and getting great ideas. A must buy for all brides for their bridesmaids!

What a poignant romantic book. I adore stories where lovers get back together and this one really hit the spot. It had lots of great suspense too. I was excited to discover it was part of a series.

Wonderful story with real characters. Their dilemma really touched my heart. I loved Tish and all her foibles and Shane was such a hero. I can't wait until book number three of the Wedding Veil Wishes.

I found myself stopping this book and finding other things to read. While on vacation I picked it back up and found that really enjoyed the story of two ex's re-examining their marriage. I found the premise that Shane was engaged and Tish was the video person and little to creepy but once all the characters came into play you understood. Give it a chance!

Check out the Wedding Veil Wishes series about legend that claims this antique Irish wedding veil can grant your heart's deepest desire...There Goes the Bride , Addicted to Love (Book #3) due out October 2008. If you enjoy this author she also writes for Blaze check out her medical series; Secret Seduction (Harlequin Blaze) and Lethal Exposure (Harlequin Blaze).


THE WEDDING VEIL FAIRY TALE from her website: http://www.loriwilde.com/index.html

Once upon a time in long ago Ireland, there was a beautiful young witch with a great talent for tatting lace. People came from far and wide to buy the lovely wedding veils she made. But there were others in the community who were jealous of her success and told the magistrate she was casting spells on the men of the village. The magistrate had her arrested, but then he fell in love with the young witch. To honor him, she promised never to use magic again. She made one last wedding veil, investing it with the power to grant the wearer's most heartfelt wish, and then she wore it on her own wedding day to the magistrate. It was passed down through the generations but the veil was eventually lost.

ONCE SMITTEN, TWICE SHY
LORI WILDE


Rating: 4.5 Enchantments

Wedding videographer Tish Gallagher is about to lose practically everything. Her business is going downhill fast and she's practically broke. So when she looks at the so-called lucky wedding veil in her room, she has only one wish, to get out of debt. Things start to look up after that, especially when her next potential client is the president's daughter. The only hitch? The fiancée is none other than Tish's ex-husband.

Shane Tremont has never forgotten his ex-wife Tish, especially the way she drove him crazy, both good and bad. After an in-the-line-of-duty injury from protecting the president's daughter, Shane has suddenly found himself engaged to none other than the first daughter. But the first time he sees Trish at the president's ranch, talking away with his fiancée, Shane realizes all those old feelings might still be there.

I so enjoyed this book! ONCE SMITTEN, TWICE SHY has everything a good read should have. Two dynamic leads, sizzling chemistry between the two and a nice dose of humor keep this reader turning the pages straight through.

I have to say one of my favorite scenes in the book is shortly after Shane is introduced to Tish, who'll be the videographer for his upcoming nuptials. Unsure what to do, he follows her down to the bathroom to try and talk her out of it. But when his new fiancée comes in and says she knows all about the history between the two, well it's just too enjoyable of a scene!

ONCE SMITTEN, TWICE SHY is the second book in Ms. Wilde's Wedding Veil Wishes series. I look forward to reading the next book in this fabulous series, due out October 2008.

Lisa
Enchanting Reviews
May 2008

Tish and Shane are madly in love and in lust with each other. Within less than a year after getting married, a crisis happens which causes each of them to make stupid decisions, and they divorce. Two years later, they still long for each other but don't act on it. Shane proposes to someone he likes but does not love. His new fiancé Elysee hires Tish to make a video film of the engagement party and wedding.

This story might be ok for someone wanting nothing too brainy with a feel good ending. Tish was wonderfully artistic and creative, but she had no practicality or business sense. She was further weakened by her habit of burying her emotions under excess spending. I could accept the initial set of stupid actions causing the divorce due to a crisis. But I did not like the dumb decisions both Tish and Shane were making two years later. Therefore, I didn't have enough sympathy for them to be able to enjoy the story. However, there may be some readers who will find humor in watching impractical foolishness and don't need to sympathize with the characters. In Spoilers below, I describe a few actions that annoyed me, which might help readers decide if they would enjoy this book in a way that I did not. If one is not annoyed, the rest of the story was entertaining. On the plus side, the author wrote a wonderfully sensual sex scene for the couple's first date.

CAUTION SPOILERS.

I was annoyed at Tish's stupidity over the way she handled her client lunch at the beginning of the book. She was behind on all of her bills. Her credit cards were maxed out. Her car was to be repossessed. Yet she takes two people to lunch who see the waiter cut up her two credit cards which have been cancelled. Because of that, the potential client had to pay the bill and never hired her.

Then, immediately after that, she spent her last $94 on a pair of shoes, leaving only $3 to her name for food. I have a hard time sympathizing with such self destructive behavior.

I can't believe Shane was such a wimp that he would ask Elysee to marry him when his inner thoughts at the moment were "Tell her it was a mistake. Tell her you didn't mean to ask her to marry you just yet."

I did not like that Tish walked through the house, outside and into her car, and then drove through all kinds of secret service protection when Larkin held a gun at her side. Her life had been threatened with the fire. She should have known he would kill her anyway. She should have run for it while she was in a place full of secret service agents. Instead she stupidly went with him to her car and drove off so he could kill her in private.

Later, Elysee sneaks away from her secret service protection to go to an isolated location alone where an assassin is waiting to kill someone. She has no weapon yet intends to help the targeted victim.

Sexual language: moderate. Number of sex scenes: two. Setting: current day U.S. Copyright: 2008. Genre: contemporary romance and chick lit.

I was looking for something for a wedding. This book was just what I needed. Lots of pictures. Highly recommend it. Shipping and correspondence with seller was great. I love amazon.com....Thanks, Angie

Martha Stewart has been my role model and continues to inspire me. Her magazines are worth subscribing to. They are filled with lots of ideas. she is a remarkable teacher.

I checked this book out at the library and had to keep renewing it! I used this for so many ideas for my wedding, and we spent less than 10k on the WHOLE thing by doing a lot of the things ourselves. Many people remarked it was the best wedding they've ever been to. I would have bought the book if I could have found it used, but it was too much new for my budget. Get this book! You won't regret it! Another great book for modern but charming wedding ideas is Jo Gartin's Weddings: An Inspiring Guide for the Stylish Bride. You can have a charming wedding without going into debt!

First, I would like to personally thank Martha (and her team) for the wonderful inspiration and pleasure that my family and I gleaned from this book. After having copied flower ideas and taken on board general tips given, on the big day we were bowled over with the amount of appreciation shown and praise given by guests. The results were truly wonderful.

I would like to point out that even though at first glance, it appears that a small fortune would have to be spent to achieve any of the ideas sold in this book, that is simply NOT the case. (In our case, where we took advice we saved quite a lot of money.)

In fact, the ideas that we realized turned out to be the cheapest yet offered the most 'wow factor'. Truly, Martha is a wizard at making the most out of the simplest things. She absolutely knows what she is talking about and I recommend this book highly.

This book is beautiful. The pictures are great and there are a ton of ideas in it. I am having an outdoor wedding in September/October and I could not have bought a better book. There are ideas about everything from the flowers to soaps to put in the bathroom during the reception. I am using quite a few of the ideas I found in the book. Love it Love it Love it

I bought this book for myself when I got married and lets just say, unless you have a kitchen made for top chefs chances are you are going to need to buy a lot of different ingredients for each meal. Everything turns out great when you do make it but just be prepared to get quite a few things at the grocery store.

The most comprehensive cooking guide I have ever found. Makes a wonderful gift - I just got a copy for my son who moved out of home for the first time, didn't matter that he isn't getting married. Wonderful

I love my big red Betty Crocker Cookbook. As an experienced cook, I still refer to it for information and basic techniques and recipes. The Bridal Edition contains all this, and also educational information that anyone just starting out will need, such as how to organize your kitchen and what basic staples you need for your pantry. I give these as wedding gifts and they have been hugely appreciated.

great initail cookbook, and good for more experienced cooks too. gives advice for stocking your kitchen, entertaining and great recipes, including a microwave section and a 20 minutes or less section. My husband and I bought this right after we got engaged, I took it with me when I went to register for the kitchen list, and we make a recipe toether at least once a week from it.

Although I cooked for some time before I received this cookbook, it is still one of the first books I go to for recipes. It makes a great gift for a bride who is just starting to cook or who has been cooking for years.

Another great story about Lilly! This book tells about her wish to be the flower girl in her teacher's wedding and how Lilly must be satisfied to be the flower girl's ASSISTANT. That is until the "real" flower girl freezes and is unable to walk down the aisle.

My daughter loves this book and Lilly's purple purse. However I did buy the collection last year and was much cheaper than what they are charging now. It is definitely a must have.

Children's Book

Lilly's Big Day is not only a wonderful book but also a god-send for a little girl about to be a flower girl. I bought it for my granddaughter when we learned she was to be in a big wedding as a flower girl. At the time she was just 3. She loved the book and understood the story and understood the importance of being a good flower girl and practiced every day and when the time came she enjoyed the wedding hugely and helped another little girl who did not quite know what was expected. She has been in three weddings since the first and we call her the "professional". I send the book to anyone who is about to be a flower girl.

I love the Lilly books, as do my granddaughters. She's cute and sassy, and one of my favorite Henkes characters. Enjoy!

An instant classic!

Henke does it again, great book. Henke creates very real characters who grapple with emotions about as intense as I've seen for this format. In Lilly's perfect day, her teacher, Mr. Slinger, in an act of naked nepotism, elevates his own niece to the role of flower girl. This despite the inordinate amount of energy Lilly has put towards practicing for the event, the proficiency with which she has rehearsed every precocious countenance, the inestimable classroom bragging rights with which she fixates her anticipation. This mouse is due her fate, and only the venal world of adult institutions could deny her.

No one can quite bring themselves to be direct her Lilly. "Do you understand what we are trying to tell you?" they ask. How can a child honestly answer that question? How can a parent honestly interpret a child's answer to that question. My stomach was in a knot for Lilly. I knew this was a Henke book, I knew it had to have a happy ending. But how could Lilly's youthful, brittle narcissism possibly absorb the onslaught of such a sleight? I wouldn't dream of ruining the ending here, but I will provide a little hint by saying that a baby mouse dose of propanolol would have gone a long way. But even the villainous niece's feelings are spared, as Henke ties up all the strands as only he can. Thumbs up for Henkes! And go Bears!

I have done a lot of sewing. I did make bridesmaid dresses and altered brides dresses. It was very interested to read about the different technics in the making of a good bridal dress. I hope I will get to make one in the near future and than I can use this book for the fine touches
This book is not for beginners.
Lucie Zandstra

The Susan Khalje book is an excellent source of its sort - not speaking of the nice design and pictures, it tells you everything you would want to know when trying to make an evening or wedding dress. Susan Khalje gives many interesting tips and tricks that would otherwise be very time-consuming to figure them out, like how and where exactly attach boning, what layers to use under skirts to make them look as you want to, how to work with lace and how to place it on the curved bodice by hiding the cut places, she gives suggestions as what fabrics to use for what garments - she is very fond of silk organza - for petticoats, underlining, bone channels.

This is one of the rare books that show you professional-done garments and reveal all their making secrets. Even if you're an advanced sewer, I still think you'll find many good tips here. Maybe a pure beginner would not be able to appreciate the value of the information given.

Highly recommend this book if you are making a wedding gown for the first time. Very clear instructions complete with pictures. There is also great chapter on how to attach lace.

I have been sewing for over 25 years and have a degree in design. However, I am always looking to evolve my technique, and I looked into this book because I wanted something that detailed couture techniques for formalwear. In reading other comments on this site before I purchased this book, I noticed some reviewers did not like it because of the outdated dresses. However, I wanted to add that while the specific dresses shown in this book are dated, the techniques described and illustrated are fantastic. This book is for someone that already knows how to sew well, but wants to take their sewing up another level. Don't buy this book expecting to copy one of the dresses used in the examples. Buy this book if you are looking for instruction on choosing and adding stability, using boning, etc, etc. This is about applying couture techniques to your own design. I was looking for something very specific, and found this book to be very helpful. I am glad I purchased it.

Though some of the featured gowns are very "eighties" (big sleeves, big skirts), this book is wonderful for showing how to engineer and fit the understructure or foundation necessary to achieve a remarkable fit on evening wear. The detailed instructions on preparing a muslin are easy to follow and thorough, and this book describes the small steps that, if followed, provide a "knock-em-out" gown that will stay put, even when dancing. Underlining, corsets, boning, and "how to keep things from drooping" are all demystified here. This will be terrific for evening wear and costumes, too, once the wedding gown is finished.

Carson McCullers twists and wrings every prickled feeling out of her young protagonist into a disturbingly entertaining one-day read. The Member of the Wedding is a slow, detailed painting of only two days in the life of twelve year old Frankie Addams: the miserable, sour August day in Georgia when she hears that her brother is getting married, and the eventful hours she spends roaming her town on the day before the wedding.

McCullers does a compelling job of coaxing the reader into the frustrated, tortured world of Frankie's mind. We mourn with her on the subject of her unfortunate height and hideous crew haircut, which cast her from the petty adolescent society. We alternately resent and pity her pathetic six-year-old cousin John Henry West, and strain with her to win even a fleeting moment of respect from her distant watchmaking father. It is her relationship with Berenice, the family's cook and babysitter, that is the most vivid and human. If not for Berenice's sensible and tart remarks, I would have lost patience with Frankie and the book quickly.

The few complaints I have could not be remedied without taking the unique edge off of the book's message. At times it is difficult to follow Frankie in her delusional dreams of becoming part of her brother's new family. In reality, the book has very little to do with the wedding; it is glossed over in a page or two, the concentration being more on the great expectations and the subsequent downfall. I do wish that there had been more background with the relationship between Frankie and Jarvis (her brother), which would have made her fantasies of running off with him more understandable. As it was, they were very nearly strangers and I was frustrated with Frankie for being so stupid that she thought there was even a possibility of being a part of their post-wedding lives. The title is a bit misleading as well; member of the wedding connotes actually being in the wedding party, and Frankie was merely an observer. There are also incongruities in relation to Frankie's age throughout the book, which may actually serve more to highlight both the child and the teenager in her. For instance, the tantrum she throws when she is not included on the honeymoon seems ridiculously childish, yet she remains composed as she drinks beer in a seedy bar with a drunken soldier. It's too bad the book deals in such delicious subtlety and psychological darkness, or it would be wonderful for readers who are closer to adolescence themselves. As it is, the book is more suited to readers older than sixteen, at least.

All in all, this piece conveyed beautifully many of the painful themes of humanity and the life of a young, freakish girl desperately trying to find her place in the world. A tasty read that you won't be able to put down if you enjoy gnawing on rich, real human themes.

As I age and read more--wondering always why, in this contemporary America, did it take me so long to enjoy reading; worrying always why, in this even-newer America, is this next generation reading, and enjoying it, lesser still--I understand better a just past world. I understand it better because of the reality reading reveals--the truths of both non-fiction and fiction.
J.D. Salinger's daughter once remarked her father couldn't keep straight the people in the world from the people in books with the people only in his head. Lucky man. . .(Lucky me. . .I do know Holden Caulfield; I know Holden Caulfield better than I know. . .
. . .and now, I also know Frankie (F. Jasmine) Addams and her closest adult companion, Berenice Sadie Brown. Thanks, Carson McCullers, for peopling up my world.

It seems that nobody can write about desolation like Carson McCullers. The sense of not being part of something is common to her stories. "The Member of the Wedding" is her third novel, published in 1946, six years after her début with "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter". Shorter in scoop than that other book, nevertheless as deep, this little novel is an unforgettable tale of a misplace childhood.

Frankie is in her early teens. Her older brother, who lives abroad, is getting married, and this is the biggest excitement of her life. The girl sees in the event the chance of abandoning her boring life, populated mostly by the servant, Berenice, and her cousin John Henry. Her father is virtually an absent figure, and this is the family link missing in her life.

The girl seems to have spent all the time trying to connect with something or someone. "This was the summer when for a long time (Frankie) had not been a member" is stated at some point. The way of overcoming this problem is growing up, becoming an adult, therefore, a member. On the other hand, she expects to become very close friends with her brother and sister-in-law when the three of them would travel all around the world all the time. Frankie seems to fail to recognize that a couple doesn't want a third member.

Since she is not happy with herself, the girl chances her own name to F. Jasmie and later to Frances. However much the surface is different, her interior is in the same state of discontentment. Throughout her journey, the girl will come across half a dozen characters who will affect her somehow. A soldier tries to seduce her. It is a victory to the protagonist, since only women - and not teenagers - get involved in such an affair. In "The Member of the Wedding", McCullers deals frankly the sexual awakening of her character, and the loss of Frankie's innocence.

Colors are extremely important in McCullers' prose. The very first line states that it was a green Summer. We are frequently remembered that Frankie has gray eyes, and Berenice, one blue and another one brown. Other senses are also touched when the girl, the maid and the cousin listen to a tuner working on a piano.

Early in "The Member of the Wedding" Frankie says that `it looks to me like everything has just walked off and left me'. This sense of not being part of anything accompanies the character the whole time. In the end, this is a feeling that we all have in our lives. And writing about this specific girl in the 1940s, McCullers is talking about the world and time in history.

This is a book about Frankie Adams, a twelve year old girl coming of age in the South during World War II. We see her world through her eyes, so that the reader gets a skewed version of the world around Frankie. Clearly all is not right with her, as her brother is getting married and Frankie thinks that she will be going off with her brother and his bride. Frankie spins a total fantasy around this concept. She does not think that two is company and three is a crowd.

Why does she do this? There are many reasons. Some of them are rather dark. Frankie's mother died giving birth to her. Her father has remained a widower, letting Frankie sleep in the same bed with him until she was about twelve, when he finally gave her the boot. Her best friend is her six year old first cousin, John Henry. He likes to sleep over, and when he does, he sleeps in the bed with Frankie. She caresses him when he sleeps, and even takes to licking him behind his ear while he slumbers. She also has apparently had a sexual encounter of some kind with a neighborhood boy, an incident about which she will not speak. The author weaves these details into the story, glossing over them, leaving the reader feeling shocked. This feeling is exacerbated by the almost casual interjection of these details.

There is so much emotional trauma in Frankie's life that it is amazing she can function at all. Also distressing to Frankie is the fact that she is isolated from children her own age. The neighborhood girls, who are just a little older than her and whom Frankie envies, shun her. Her father pretty much ignores her, leaving her upbringing to the housekeeper, Bernice. When it comes time to buy her a dress for her brother's wedding, she is sent off to buy the dress by herself. It is little wonder that the dress she ends up purchasing is totally unsuitable. Her feeling of isolation is palpable to the reader.

Although Frankie is somewhat of a tomboy, she likes getting dressed up, slathering on lipstick, and taking a walk through the town, calling herself F. Jasmine, looking older than her years. In this guise, she meets a soldier, who takes her for being much older. It comes as no surprise when it all goes horribly wrong. Yet, Frankie is evidently a survivor and manages to fend for herself.

The moment of truth for Frankie arrives when her brother's wedding finally takes place, but by then that event is almost anti-climactic, as events continue to buffet Frankie, leaving her more isolated that ever before. Still, she continues on, not seeming to have learned anything all from her experiences, an emotionally troubled child suffering a severe disconnection from the world.

This is a thematically complex story told through the jagged fragments of the life of a young girl, one who views the world in a disjointed, unrealistic way, her world view clouded by inner demons that are never given a voice. It is a story that is dark and melancholic, leaving the reader to ponder upon a life so young, yet so despairing.

This is my very favorite book and, in my opinion, far superior to "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter."

I was not an adolescent when I read it--I was 23--but I was astonished by how often McCullers was able to perfectly describe what I had believed to be indescribable experiences. In some ways I think that my attachment to the book grew from my ability to relate to Frankie's anxiety. The pace of the book, which all takes place during one stereotypically oppressive southern summer, becomes more frantic as Frankie's anxiety mounts. Her efforts to belong, to be a member of something, push her to force attachments with others even while she knows they are superficial. I'm certain that, on this point alone, readers who remember the desperation to belong during their adolescence will relate to the novel. McCullers also conveys Frankie's longing for something to happen, to take her beyond the repetetive tedium of her young life and infuse it with adventure. When Frankie takes this task into her own hands, the results are harsh and startling.

What truly makes McCullers and this slim novel so amazing is her prose, which is both so sparse and crisp and yet so eloquent and expressive. Every word seems so deliberate that I couldn't believe there could be a more perfect way to depict the scene. At the novel's start, I will always remember the sentence, "At last the summer was like a green sick dream, or like a silent crazy jungle under glass."

I wish I could convey how much this book gripped me. It made me feel that my experiences were shared in a much deeper way than I ever could have imagined or hoped. "The Member of the Wedding" is funny, distressing, and deeply sad: as perfect a novel as I've ever read.

I'm so happy Amazon.com has marketplace sellers. I was able to pick this up cheap and take it with me as I got to think about an upcoming wedding I'm excited to participate in. Good ideas and in a good format.

Weddings from the Heart was just OK...I'm planning a wedding and looking for different ideas for vows and readings - and this book just wasnt' for me. I earmarked a few pages - but not many. One book that was INCREDIBLE was "the knot guide to weddings vows and traditions"! Great book with TONS of ideas - i earmarked a TON of pages here. I was reluctant to get it at first just b/c it was "the knot" - even though they are the so called "wedding guru's"...you know....I just thought others might have other insightful advice....well, not so...trust me - save your money and just go buy the knot's guide - it was the best! (at least for me!)

Most of this book was irrelevant for what I wanted. I was looking for a source for religiously-oriented vows, prayers, and blessings which I could use to create an ecumenical wedding service. This book DOES have a section of such things --and I did find it useful for comparison purposes-- but the main emphasis is on contemporary vows, addresses, etc., most of which seemed just too fluffy for me. If you do want very emotionally-laden, "unique to you" and non-traditional wedding, go for this. If you seriously want to compare weddings from different Judeo-Christian traditions, I highly recommend _Weddings: A Complete Guide to All Religious and Interfaith Marriage Services_ instead.

Ms. Kingma gives engaged couples excellent advice and options over the traditional ceremonies. She includes examples for divorced couples, couples with children, couples who want to honor other family members and friends, even couples who have been through abuse and addictions to find love. Also given are wedding traditions and readings from around the world that brides and grooms can incorporate into their personally tailored ceremony.

If you truly want a wedding from your heart, with vows that truly bind, then this book is for you. The suggested ceremonies can be tinkered with and tailored to your taste and honor your personal beliefs. Thanks, Ms. Kingma, for reading the hearts of engaged couples everywhere! We're using this book for our own wedding this year, and I just can't praise it enough.

I plan to elope and have never wanted to say the standard religious vows from my Roman Catholic childhood. Kingma is a master of words. Capturing love is not easy. Saying the most with the least is the magic. Bring illumination into your personal ceremony with Daphne's wisdom. Better yet, consider having her as your marriage officiant.