The Wedding People: The hilarious and moving million-copy bestseller (International Edition)

By Alison Espach

The runaway New York Times bestseller with over one million copies sold
A Today Show #ReadwithJenna Book Club Pick, New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice, and a #1 Indie Next Pick
Named a Best Book of the Year by The Guardian, Time, Chicago Tribune Biblioracle, HuffPost, US Magazine, Elle, Real Simple, and Glamour

A propulsive and uncommonly wise novel about one unexpected wedding guest and the surprising people who help her start anew.

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.

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Published Jul 30, 2024

Average rating: 7.63

6,821 RATINGS

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Community Reviews

What Bookclubbers are saying about this book

✨ Summarized by Bookclubs AI

Readers say *The Wedding People* by Alison Espach is a darkly comic, emotionally honest novel blending humor, heartbreak, and sharp social satire. Rev...

Jessica M
Jul 11, 2026
4/10 stars
Meh. Slow and Boring. I didn’t connect with the characters and wanted to quit half way through. It got a little better towards the end, saving it from a one star rating.
Mellific
Jul 09, 2026
10/10 stars
This was an easy 5 stars. I could not put this book down, and I felt like I was there with them, experiencing it all as I was reading/listening.
Jan.wagner2014@gmail.com
Jun 28, 2026
Enjoyed the book. Easy read, light topic. 3 stars.
MamaShootman
Jun 01, 2026
7/10 stars
It took a long time to get into this book and its characters.
BigDreamsInMomJeans
Apr 14, 2026
7/10 stars
A great beach-read; unexpectedly deep and lighthearted af the same time. Loved it!

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