It's rare for a book to come with a money-back guarantee, but especially one like this. As good as Sophie Kinsella or your money back screams the sticker on the front. And, given the huge Shopaholic fan base out there, that's quite a claim to make. Still, if ever there was a heroine to dethrone Becky Bloomwood then it is one Isabel Bookbinder.
| Confetti Confidential by Holly McQueen | |
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| Category: Women's Fiction | |
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Reviewer: Zoe Morris
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| Summary: Isabel Bookbinder's third adventure sees her planning weddings for the rich and famous, but not without incident. A fun, easy to read book, that gets a definite thumbs up. | |
| Buy? Yes | Borrow? Yes |
| Pages: 528 | Date: June 2010 |
| Publisher: Arrow Books | |
| ISBN: 978-0099545750 | |
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Confetti Confidential is the third book in the Isabel series, but the first one I've read. Even without that grand claim on the front, you couldn't help but draw comparisons between Kinsella's series and this one from the very first page. The writing style is virtually identical – to the point where you do actually wonder if this is just a pseudonym – and while the chatty, chummy, conversational approach is not for everyone, if it's the sort of thing you like then this is the sort of book you'll love.
Isabel has had a few false starts, work-wise, but she is now in her dream job, as a wedding planner extraordinaire. Or, hmm, maybe just assistant to a wedding planner extraordinaire for now, but then you have to start somewhere. And, whatever her father says, it's not really a step down from being a Creative Director at a fashion label, even if the job title might lead you to that conclusion. But still, weddings are a lot of fun – heaps of white satin and lace, delicious five course meals and hand-finished cakes, happy couples. Isabel just knows she's going to enjoy her new job, a lot.
Except…her new boss, wedding guru Pippa, doesn't has quite the same faith in Isabel's Bride Management techniques that Isabel herself does, the best laid plans can sometimes fall apart at the last minute, there are only so many spumas a girl can eat before starting to gag and, sometimes, brides just don't want to get married, which is really rather unfortunate. Undeterred, Isabel soldiers on, but with crisis following crisis and catastrophe after catastrophe, will she ever manage to pull off a wedding that's a day to remember for all the right reasons?
This is a really fun book that doesn't take itself too seriously. It's definitely more of a howler than it is a tear jerker, but the odd bit might tug a little on your heartstrings. I was impressed by its length (a chunky 500+ pages) and the way the story ploughed on throughout, never feeling like it had been padded out. Clearly a story solely about a wedding might be stretching it just a little, but the additional threads to the story, from friendships to family relationships to more than a few romantic entanglements, kept it interesting and add fresh material to each chapter.
My sole criticism of the book is perhaps really linked to one of its key strengths: there is one off shoot involving a handsome wedding photographer that seems to end quite abruptly which was frustrating because I had been so drawn into the story and so swept away with the characters that I really wanted something to happen. This occurred again later, this time with the camera man, and I couldn't help feeling that not enough thought had gone into these encounters, and that they could have been more significant and less of an after thought. But, if the rest of the book hadn't been up to much, I really wouldn't have been so bothered by this, so it really only goes to show how into it I was by the end, and how the characters' disappointments somehow became mine too.
This is a worthy read on its own, and the fact that it is the third in a series doesn't affect this. There may be subtleties or in jokes I didn't pick up on, not having read the previous installments, but at no point was I left confused about the people and their interconnecting lives in the way you can sometimes be with sequels. Everything is handily explained from scratch, and if I'd not read the blurb at the front, I never would have guessed that Isabel had had previous outings.
Thanks go to the publishers for sending us this book.
Got wedding fever? Revenge of the Wedding Planner by Sharon Owens and Wedding Season by Katie Fforde are similarly themed reads that highlight just how much of a popular topic wedding planning is for chick-lit writers.
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You can read more book reviews or buy Confetti Confidential by Holly McQueen at Amazon.co.uk Amazon currently charges £2.99 for standard delivery for orders under £20, over which delivery is free.
You can read more book reviews or buy Confetti Confidential by Holly McQueen at Amazon.com.
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