The Wedding People by Alison Espach
Phoebe’s husband cheated and left her. She went to a fancy hotel to commit suicide. Instead, she became Maid of Honor at Lila’s week-long, million-dollar wedding. Phoebe is the natural foil for Lila, though both are introspective & self-obsessed.
Phoebe has a PhD in 19th-century literature. After graduating, nothing worked. Despite years of trying, she was not about to publish her research. She “wrote a dissertation tracking each time Jane Eyre went on a walk in Brontë’s novel.” She was unable to secure a tenure-track teaching position. She is married to Matt, a successful Professor of Philosophy. After five rounds of IVF, she could not get pregnant. Matt leaves Phoebe for Mia, a tenured professor with a child, who has achieved everything Phoebe failed at. Phoebe shines at the wedding, where she is a novelty. This is a novel of redemption through leaving home.
While Phoebe is a total failure at her St. Louis school, she is a celebrity among the Wedding people. “I like that you know when gargoyles were invented.”
“I think it’s just your vibe,” Gary says. “You come off as … very smart. Like you’ve studied everything and now have all the world’s knowledge inside of you.”
“Is that obnoxious?”
“It’s the best.”
Phoebe was a “small fish” within her school
faculty, but a “big fish in a small pond” among the wedding people. While
Phoebe was ordinary in mid-America, she shines among the sophisticated elite of
Newport, Rhode Island. I had a similar experience when I left my elite college
for the real world.
Most nights, she looked back at all of her research, all of her spreadsheets, all of her journals and her papers and her injections and thought, What the f**k?
Art helps us feel alive. And this had been true for Phoebe—Phoebe used to read books and feel astounded. She used to walk around galleries, inspired by the beautiful human urge to create. But that was years ago. Now she can’t stand the sight of her books. Can’t bear the thought of reading hundreds of pages just to watch Jane Eyre get married again.
“And my advisor kept emailing me being like, Who cares if it’s a piece of shit! Everybody’s dissertation is a piece of shit. That’s what dissertations are.”
“What are you doing to the décor?” Lila asks. She looks at them like she’s stumbled upon a bank robbery. “They’re books, not décor,” Phoebe says. Phoebe doesn’t have too many beliefs, but this is one of them.
“Tomorrow morning, you can join us for the bridal brunch in the conservatory.” A ridiculous sentence if Phoebe ever heard one.
So many clever observations.
Check out https://amazon.com/shop/influencer-20171115075 for Omega Cat Press books and book recommendations.
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