Book Review: The Wedding People

The Wedding People by Alison Espach has been on my tbr for quite a while. I picked it up a few months ago and decided to wait til the start of summer to read it because summer always makes me think of wedding season.

The novel follows Phoebe, an adjunct English professor from St. Louis, Missouri, who has been coping with her divorce. Her husband, whom she met in grad school and is a philosopher professor at the same university as her, left her for their friend (another professor!) in the middle of the pandemic and amidst their fertility struggles. Life is not what she thought it would be. She’s divorced, she doesn’t have a baby, she’s been struggling to write her book or anything worth publishing for her research, and she’s just generally unhappy.

When she was still married, she would dream of visiting a coastal resort in Newport, Rhode Island called the Cornwall. But, her and Matt – her ex – never made it up there. Decked in a beautiful green gown that she has had in her closet for a long time and never found the chance to wear it, she flies to Newport and checks in to the Cornwall. All with the intention of killing herself there at her dream resort.

But, her plan starts to go awry when she meets Lila, a bride who has booked out the whole hotel for her wedding guests. There are 6 days worth of events all leading up to the big day. Somehow Phoebe’s reservation got through and Lila absolutely cannot have someone committing suicide at the hotel during her wedding week! The two women are opposites, but surprisingly get along and can’t stop confiding in each other. Phoebe told her, a virtual stranger, about her plan to kill herself. Lila confides in her about her friends, mother, and unsure feelings for her fiancé and future stepdaughter. Meanwhile, Phoebe also gets to know Gary, the groom, during the wedding week and the two might get along even better than the engaged couple or Phoebe and her ex-husband. How will the week all unfold?

The book was so engaging and the more I read, the more I fell in love with the book. I loved the characters, even Lila who could be difficult at times but I could find relatable in some ways. There aren’t any “villains” in the book and I think even though some of the characters and the story can be absurd at times, they’re also really realistic in ways. The novel may start off in a dark place, but it really is an optimistic novel and really shows that you never know what is just around the corner for you.

Below is one of the quotes from the book that I especially liked because of how true I feel it is:

“There is no such thing as a happy place. Because when you are happy, everywhere is a happy place. And when you are sad, everywhere is a sad place.”

Read this if you contemporary fiction with dark humor and a little bit of a love story.

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