Miss Manners' Guide to a Surprisingly Dignified Wedding
How to insert humor into the often deadly dull prose that details wedding niceties? Ask Miss Manners’ daughter to coauthor the collection of advice; Chicago improvisational teacher Jacobina, along with her mom-author (Miss Manners’  Guide to Excruciatingly Correct Behavior, 1979) Judith, writes a disarmingly dry yet wonderfully funny account of the dos and don’ts for getting married. Every conceivable subject gets its space, including the absolutely right (and wrong) proposal, avoiding the “bridezilla” factor, coping with invitations, chief responsibilities of the parties in the wedding, and the three terrible ideas: weddings as (choose one) “my day,” fund-raiser, or show biz. A question-and-answer format usually follows each major block of content; it’s here where the authors let loose their humor. An amuse-bouche that, despite its humor, provides more than a dollop of great common sense. --Barbara Jacobs