Weddiculous: An Unfiltered Guide to Being a Bride

by Jamie Lee

In this irreverent wedding guide, star of Netflix’s “The Wedding Coach,” comedian and bride-to-be Jamie Lee, offers practical advice and hilarious insights on how to stay sane while planning your "big day."Weddings. What was once a beautiful celebration of a couple coming together for a lifetime of happiness has become a bit ridiculous, complete with the whimsical monogrammed mason jars and unconventional photo shoots. The Epic task of creating that special event can be nightmarish—a dizzying maze of minutiae and seemingly endless choices that might tempt you to say yes to a quickie drive-through chapel in Vegas.But weddings don’t have to be stressful. You don’t have to give in to the crazy—or give up completely. Famous funny gal Jamie Lee learned much more than she counted on pulling together her own wedding, and in Weddiculous she shares her first-hand experiences and hilarious hard-won insights with every girl who just said "yes."Jamie gives you the real low-down, puts the madness into perspective, and walks you through the process step by step in a calm, realistic, and highly entertaining way. Weddiculous includes helpful checklists, timelines, and suggestions on everything from what questions to ask vendors to how to handle difficult bridesmaids to what’s worth the extra cost (and more importantly, what’s not). Throughout, Jamie provides guidance on when you should trust your gut and when you need to listen to others.What Amy Sedaris has done for hospitality and crafting, Jamie Lee now does for weddings. Weddiculous will help remind you what’s really important about your wedding it’s just the first day in a long and happy marriage.

Genres: Nonfiction, Humor, Memoir, Comedy, Adult, Audiobook, Self Help

288 pages, Kindle Edition

Published December 27, 2016

About the author

Jamie Lee is a Los Angeles based stand-up comedian, TV writer and actress, and one of the core cast members on the hit MTV show GirlCode, as well as the host of 10 Things on TruTV. Jamie has appeared on Conan, Chelsea Lately, The Late Late Show with James Corden, Comedy Central's @Midnight, MTV's Ridiculousness, John Oliver's Stand Up Show and was a semi-finalist on Last Comic Standing. She has also written for The Pete Holmes Show, E!, Lifetime, TLC and the new Judd Apatow show on HBO, Crashing. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and a labradoodle named Dennis.

Reviews

[Samantha · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a cute, funny book I wish I would have read before I started any planning. The author is hilarious and had some good advice on things that are worth spending time on and things to not take too seriously. I skimmed a lot because I have already gotten through a lot of the planning process, and some of the things she talked about probably don’t apply to most people who don’t have an endless amount of money to spend on a wedding.

[Anais Torres · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a bride going through the wedding planning process, I loved reading this book! There were so many hilarious similarities to exactly what I’ve been dealing with. There were so many things that I thought secretly about the wedding industry, but wouldn’t admit out loud. Imagine my relief when I read the very same thoughts, insecurities and expectation form Lee.

This should be a requirement for EVERY bride to read!

This book made me laugh out loud many times. It was also one of the most down-to-earth wedding books I have read. Jamie Lee is so realistic in the sense that some things will go wrong and you have no control over it. She did a phenomenal job of comparing reality with big bridal and their unachievable expectations. Honestly the most shocking was that she even spent that much on her own wedding. To each her own, in my opinion.

Weddiculous is your daily dose of "take a chill pill." It's hilarious and I love it! Lee breaks down the entire wedding planning process and constantly reassures you that the day will be spectacular and don't sweat the small stuff!

Surely I will be gifting this book immediately to all my engaged friends or buying it as a gift to bring to bridal showers. This book is funny and lighthearted, but also very helpful for the wedding planning process as it tackles common issues brides go through and simultaneously provides creative solutions that you won't find in the typical bridal magazine or wedding planning book.

[Lindsey · Rating 3 out of 5]

I would give this book 3.5 stars if that were an option. Ultimately I would recommend this book for any bride to be because it puts things in perspective and reminds you to not take things so seriously. There were a lot of good and important points in this book - especially at the end which I thought was the strongest and most poinent part of the whole thing. Where this book lost points for me was when it dipped into oddly specific - unrelatable, and even slightly judgemental territory. I did like that the book overall takes a feminist approach but also is like 'hey, even feminists loose their minds a little when it comes to weddings and this is normal.'

I will be keeping this book to refer to certain chapters as I get closer to my own wedding and look forward to passing it on to someone else. Also I do recommend checking out the Netflix show by the same name.

[Aviva · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was definitely the hilarious, self-aware, quick read that I needed during this phase of wedding planning. Jamie Lee's sometimes over the top "advice" didn't always connect with my wedding planning process, but this is definitely a great read (and would make a great gift) for future brides!

[Riana Autumn · Rating 2 out of 5]

As you can tell from my rating, I really struggled with this book. I decided to pick this up after watching Jamie Lee's Wedding Coach on Netflix, and since I'm planning a wedding myself, I thought it would be a fun read. But I would recommend you just stick to the Netflix show and skip this book.

What I did like: I enjoyed that this book was easy to read, light-hearted and called out Big Bridal. Jamie does do a good job of commiserating with brides on the realities of wedding planning. I liked what she said about not needing a theme and not needing to over-personalize, and her thoughts on taking off the pressure of your Big Day by calling it your Medium Day. 

However, I didn't find this book helpful. It's not really a how-to book and the advice isn't anything super helpful or groundbreaking. Which is fine! But I also didn't find this book funny. So I'm not really sure what the point of it was (which may have been the book's biggest problem). The chapters were very short, repetitive and kind of all over the place. There were typos and issues with tenses switching mid-bullet point list. I think this book might have been better as an essay in a magazine, instead of a full-length book. 

The part of this book I absolutely hated was the chapter on dieting. Jamie calls herself out and admits to being shallow and falling in line with the patriarchy, but then proceeds to say some truly ignorant, anti-fat and horrible things. I get that not everyone is as "woke" about anti-fatness and certainly not in 2016, but some of this stuff made me want to put the book down. In fact, if I wasn't already 150 pages in, I would have stopped reading immediately. 

Some of the fat-phobic lines include: 

"I also feel bangin' when I'm at my thinnest."
"I love looking back on my wedding day and thinking, 'Not only was it fun, but I was thin.' It's another layer of happiness."
"Are you in a great relationship with someone who loves you for you? Sounds like a recipe for FAT!"

I get that she was trying to be funny. And I appreciate that she recognizes how shallow her thought patterns are. But she is still equating "thin" with beautiful, better and happiness, which is incredibly untrue and harmful. 

TW: fat-shaming and anti-fatness

[Catherine Christenson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Entertaining and funny book that provides realistic advice on wedding planning if you’re going for a big/conventional wedding. I would’ve given 5 stars, but I think the chapter on bridal weight loss was problematic / could be damaging for some. Complaining about your 8 lb weight loss at 120 lbs is kind of tone deaf IMO. She’s self aware but perpetuating harmful beauty ideals at the same time. I personally did not enjoy that chapter.

[Liesl Miller · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was the perfect book to read as I began my own wedding planning process.

[Celine · Rating 1 out of 5]

Corny.

[Heather F · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm not getting married, I only read this because of the upcoming "schmetflix" series. It was ok, but nothing groung-breaking.

[Morgan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Funny and with some solid wedding advice!

[Lorianna G · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very funny and very helpful! Planning a wedding is bonkers, but this book makes it easy to laugh at the process rather than cry over it.

[Amanda (Tholke) Hollenkamp · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very refreshing book that ironically I did not have time to read during my own wedding planning 😂😂😂

[Bethany · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book did what I think another edgy bridal book I read tried to do. A few of the jokes fell flat, but it was almost always clear which ideas and suggestions were meant to be jokes. If you're getting burnt out with the wedding planning process, this is a nice distraction from it all that will make you laugh and feel better about not doing everything "right."

[Caitlin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received an advanced copy of this book through the LibraryReads program.

This book is not for everyone, but it was the perfect book for me to read three weeks before my own wedding. Equal parts making fun of all of the big wedding business stuff and also indulging in how fun some of that stuff can be, and equal parts making fun of herself, her friends, and her family and professing how much she loves them, Lee's book made me laugh out loud many times. It was also one of the most down-to-earth wedding books I have read, and I can't believe I wrote that because I know how much she spent on her wedding and it seemed crazy to me (but she admits this immediately after disclosing how much her wedding cost and said it bothers her too, which is very endearing). I will say she is either very bold or did not tell her friends and family she is writing this book, because there are several times when I thought "that is going to be super awkward when this person reads this." But we as readers win, because it makes for a very enjoyable book.

[Mandy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Maybe I am simply not American enough, or lack the big wedding dream, but this book simply didn’t speak to me. Too much centred on “it’s the brides big day”, with only an acknowledgement of that at the end. Just not for me.
Though I can imagine that if you dream of the big day and want the princess for a day wedding, this book actually has god and sensible advice.

[Jesse · Rating 1 out of 5]

Ridiculous. You lost me at "My wedding only cost 65K!" 65K thumbs down.

[Holly · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book for two reasons, one of them being incredibly obvious: I got engaged last year and I'm in the middle of planning my wedding. I wanted to know what advice Jamie Lee had because I felt like she had some really good things to say in her short-lived Netflix show. My second reason was that I really really really needed a laugh this week (or at least some levity) and this helped me get that.

This book is broken into focus sections, like "Dress, Hair and Makeup", the "inner circle" (i.e. the bridesmaids and groomsmen), and "the outer circle" (the guests) among others. There are subsections within each one that focus on different things, sprinkled with Jamie telling personal stories about how she almost didn't get along with her in-laws, the drama at the bachelorette party, etc. She actually drops some really good advice along the way, which was nice to see.

Most of this book is Jamie's response to what she calls "Big Bridal". This would be all the wedding magazines, The Knot, and anything else that constantly pushes the idea of the actually wedding day being this giant fantasy come to life. Every subsection starts with her giving a generalization about what Big Bridal would say, like "The venue says something about you and your fiance, so make sure it really represents who you are!" Jamie then counters that with her own sayings, like "No, the venue is just where you decided to have the wedding. It doesn't need this deeper meaning." And then she spends a few pages defending her stance before jumping to the next subsection.

The chapters are incredibly short, so it was really easy to pick up for a little bit, read a few sections, and put down to do something else. There are times when Jamie has a lot of personal stories that make it feel fun and relatable and I want to keep reading and there are other times her stories drag a little bit. She doesn't always strike the right balance with that, but there are usually enough jokes within it all that those kept me entertained enough to stay with it.

As someone who has already started planning a wedding, the first half of the book was all stuff I had already gone through. I figured something like this was going to happen, so I'm not holding it against it, but there wasn't much advice in that section I hadn't already figured out for myself.

Still, this is funny and cute and a simple reminder that weddings are about the marriage taking place and all the other details are just that: details. They aren't going to (or shouldn't, anyway), affect the overall marriage.

[Rachael · Rating 4 out of 5]

I heard about this book via the My Favorite Murder podcast and bought it on a whim. I'm getting married in October and have really enjoyed reading books that poke at the expectations of weddings, especially from the bride's point of view. I read both of the A Practical Wedding books last year, and Something New by Lucy Knisley earlier this year.

This is a little bit wedding guide, but mostly it's a funny memoir by the author of the trials she went through in being engaged and planning her wedding. Since the wedding industry and movies try to project a "this will be the happiest time of your life!" on engaged couples, especially brides, it's just so refreshing and a relief to read books that fully acknowledge that planning a wedding is stressful and messy.

Easily my favorite thing about this book was how the author described the constant arguing with her fiance for the duration of their engagement--mostly about the wedding, from what she described. No one ever tells you how much more you fight while engaged! It's just great to read someone else saying, "We fought so much I thought we would call the whole thing off."

But the whole book was hilarious. I read most of it in a day while on an eight-hour flight. She doesn't just poke at the bridal traditions, she openly makes fun of them, while also saying, "This is what the wedding industry recommends, this is what I did, but it's important to figure out what works for you." She took the whole wedding planning timeline/checklist by the Knot and offered her own interpretations, saying things like, "I didn't even bother with this because I was too stressed out," or "You can probably just send out invitations two months beforehand, who cares?"

Overall, great book, a good reminder to take joy out of wedding planning while also making fun of it and acknowledging that it will be stressful.

[Jamie Lynn Lufrano · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sometimes funny, sometimes trying too hard; I had a love-hate relationship with this book. Some of the advice is amusing and practical. I laughed out loud at the "By-My-Side Pieces" (bridesmaids) and found the personal vow advice to be helpful. It had a lot of awkward moments, though. I cringed at some of the more "out there" opinions, the rampant overuse of "cool" phrases such "wedding AF," and the uncomfortable in-law rants that left me hoping they didn't read this book.

There are also a lot of cliches about being a stressed-out bride who is constantly fighting with her future spouse and in-laws. If that was her experience, fine, but it's presented in such a way that suggests this is a "normal" experience. I could have done without the frequent references to incest, missing child beauty queens, and unnecessarily vulgar comparisons for shock value too. I'm by no means a prude, but I don't need to hear how your wedding planner talking to you is like you being asked "not to finish" (but described more graphically than that). It had some moments that were reminiscent of Chelsea Handlers "My Horizontal Life." Regardless, it was a quick, fun guide to read.

[Ruth · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pretty funny and some of the advice was helpful to hear. That said, it was difficult at times to tell when she was being earnest and giving legit advice and when she was being a sarcastic comedian. I listened to the audiobook, so maybe the format of the print book made it easier to tell the difference. Sometimes it was obvious but other times, less so.

I do wish on the chapter that dealt with dieting that she had opted not to include her own goal number. It felt unnecessary and for those of us who do struggle or who have struggled in the past with body image and eating disorders, a concrete number makes it too easy to make comparisons. I don't have a problem with talking about dieting in general or the pressure to look good in photos, and some of the things she said were quite healthy, imo. But that number was a big yikes.

[Jessi · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, which was part guide, part memoir. It takes brides from getting engaged through the planning madness, the actual wedding day, and life after the wedding. There is a lot of practical advice on what the Big Bridal industry dictates vs. the reality of what’s actually needed to carry out that specific piece. Jamie kept things grounded and funny, which was definitely appreciated during this weird time. She was also honest with some of her regrets, like the total cost of the wedding and giving in to pressure of having 2 kids at the wedding when she had not wanted any there. This whole book will be helpful to keep in the back of my mind during the remaining months of my own wedding planning.

[Victoria · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5/5 would be my rating. It's hard to remember how much I enjoyed reading this book since I took months to read it. But it was mostly so I can read it when I'm feeling stress about planning for my own wedding. It was helpful for that reason.
Jamie Lee is a funny comedian and great at making weddings feel less do-or-die. I enjoyed her advice and stories.
There were a lot of personal experiences or opinions that might not be relevant to everyone. But overall it was a good read for this time in my life.

[Angela · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was hilarious and as a recently-engaged woman starting to look at wedding plans, it was a perfect counter to the numerous wedding magazines and articles that make this process seem terrifying (-ly expensive). Lee gives readers permission to throw traditional ideas and expenses out the window. Highly recommend to anyone getting married. Will definitely provide you with a few laughs and a fresh perspective on the process.

[Yvette Deming · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book. I actually laughed out loud multiple times. I would even pause my fiancé’s show to re-read sections to him. I wouldn’t say this is going to really help plan a wedding. There are maybe a couple of take aways but It’s more of a “you’re not crazy if you are thinking this and this is what i did and learned.” I would recommend it to anyone. Just got married, not even in a relationship? Why not, it’s hilarious and easy to read.

[Stephanie Cianci · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was studying for my second round of the California Bar Exam and planning my wedding at the same time. Needless to say, I was stressed out of my mind. I had borrowed this book from the library after hearing Jamie on a Podcast talking about it. I stopped studying and got in the bath with this book. Within 5 minutes, I was actually laughing out loud and book marking my favorite quotes. Now, my single piece of advice to brides is to read/borrow/steal this book and take the advice to heart.

[eva · Rating 5 out of 5]

As someone in the middle of wedding planning....this book is all I think about wedding and the big bridal industry...I am so glad I picked it up, it really really did help me come to terms with a lot of things and I feel so much better about planning my wedding now and doing it my way and not stressing myself over the whole Zola/The Knot and other stuff I keep reading which are not helpful at all if I don't have an unlimited budget.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

It’s so easy to get overwhelmed during the traditional wedding planning process. It’s a lot of money, a lot of decisions, and a lot of people. This book doesn’t have a lot of practical planning guidance, but it really helps reframe all of the madness - plus, I had quite a few laughs throughout my reading! Now, as I plan my own wedding, I need only keep reminding myself “there’s only so much you can control, and if you have that concept under control, you’ll be thrilled with the outcome.”

[H.P. Waitt · Rating 4 out of 5]

Such a comedic and refreshing take on wedding planning. Sure, it won’t tell you the best florists in your region, or the wedding planner that you “must” hire, but it will give you an unapologetic look and what it’s like to plan a wedding, what’s really important and why you shouldn’t (but probably still will) freak the F out over the process

[Megan · Rating 4 out of 5]

While I'm pretty far along in my wedding planning process and didn't need some of the advice, I just loved this book. It brought some humor and levity to the process and helped me let go of some of the stresses of wedding planning. I recommend this book especially to any bride who is very stressed about planning and is worried about little details ruining everything.

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Honestly laugh out loud funny at parts. Don’t expect actionable wedding planning tips here, but think of Jamie as your funny, rich friend who’s actually honest about what her wedding cost ($65k+ 😬). Really refreshing and hilarious and a great reminder to chill the f out because weddings are kind of dumb anyway.