The Wedding Party

Liked the book the first time I read it in 2010. I have read hundreds of books since then, so when the store said it had a "new" Robyn Carr book I bought it again. Buyer beware. There are many books on the store being re-released as "new." And the store doesn't let you know that you have previously purchased this book because it is a re-release. the store was happy to take my money AGAIN. I love the convenience of the kindle app and being able to purchase books to read immediately. However, one more step has been added because I have to search my kindle content to see if I already have a book. It's even worse when the name of the book has been changed!!

I am a faithful fan of Robyn Carr...I have read her Virgin River and Thunder Point series...
I once said...about books that I've enjoyed...I wish this book could go...I wanta see what
happens to the characters.
Robyn made this happen in her Virgin River and Thunder Point series...and very successfully!!
She's very clever in making her characters well developed...at a steady pace...you can't put her
book's down!!
Kathy from Texas

SPOILER ALERT: Who was beating up and shooting at Merrie if it wasn't the ex? There had to be someone because the author made a point of demonstrating that the cops' cover was blown when the mysterious male caller found out she was ok from the woman sitting in for the hospital's receptionist. Other than Pam and her Dad, I didn't really like any of the characters which surprised me even more than the fact that I didn't care much for the book, and the Epilogue should have been left off entirely.

There was a point in this book that I was afraid. Afraid that I wouldn't be able to find any redeeming qualities in the heroine, Charlene. And believe me, it was somewhat hard to do. It's not that she is a terrible person, but she is so oblivious to what her actions do to those around her that I wanted to shake her!

Then there is Charlene's daughter, Stephanie. Her I just wanted to smack. Luckily, the reader gets to see Stephanie's transformation and can even almost forgive her attitude by the end.

Without giving anything away I want to let you know that as much as those women drove me crazy, I had no harsh feelings toward Charlene's fiancé Dennis at all.

The storyline about Charlene's mom Lois was wonderfully written. I don't think it's too spoiler-ish to say she is getting either Alzheimer's or dementia and it's just heart-breaking. Being such an avid reader myself I was instantly sobbing when poor Lois has a moment when she is unable to read the words in a book. How terrifying! Robyn Carr certainly has a way with words and knows how to tug the heart strings.

This was probably my least favorite Carr book so far, but it was still a good read and I would still recommend it to all who like her other books.

Charlene Dugan is an important family attorney who sees troubled relationships every day. She, herself, has been divorced for over 25 years and has been seeing someone, Dennis, for about 5 years. It is a comfortable relationship where they both live in their own homes and see each other two to three times a week. Her daughter Stephanie who is a school teacher is in a live-in relationship and engaged to Grant who is studying for the police academy. Charlene's mother Lois is having some mental difficulties. Charlene's ex-husband Jake is a wonderful father and has never really let go of Charlene and is always popping up in her life in one way or another. As much as Charlene loves her independent lifestyle, she is the one who decides it's time to marry Dennis. When life begins spiraling out of control in this three generation of women, it not only brings them closer together, but answers alot of unanswered questions regarding thier pasts. Is this what the three women really want for the rest of their lives?
I thought this was a magnificant story regarding these three womens lives. How one wedding preparation can change things. I really got to know and enjoy every character in this book and never knew what was going to happen next from one page to another. It also touched me very deeply with the pre-diagnosis of Lois's Alzheimers and how the family and even neighbors rallied around to care for her. There isn't anyone like Robyn Carr to bring such love, romance, compassion, excitement and amusement into her stories. I would give this more than 5 stars if I could.

After her divorce, Charlene Dugan vowed never to marry again. Twenty-five years later, she finds herself asking her man the big question. After all, Dennis is mature and their relationship is comforting and steady. Her daughter, Stephanie, is at a crossroads, her mother's mental health is fading, her career is crazy-busy, and she's spending more time with her irritating ex, Jake, than anyone else. Who wouldn't want to take the plunge? Except things on the surface aren't always what they appear, and the heart has a way of leading you right where you should be.

I've been a huge Carr fan for years, and though this wasn't my favorite of hers, I liked it. This felt more like women's fiction to me, and a mature heroine was a nice change. The daughter was irritating, but she saved my opinion of her nicely at the end. Carr described Alzheimer's brilliantly, and this book dug into the psyche to search for what we truly want from life. I was team Jake from the get-go. My kind of hero. A book not to be overlooked.

After a disastrous marriage when she was too young, family attorney Charlene Dugan has no plans to marry ever again. Now forty-five and seeing someone for five years, Charlene appreciates the status quo of having her own home and a significant other in that own home. With her nerves on edge from a couple going through a horrific divorce, her daughter stuns Charlene when she tells her that does not want to end up like her mom, all alone. On top of that flogging, her mom seems to be showing signs of mental instability and her former spouse Jake, who seems to be around a lot, accuses her of not being able to commit. To prove they are wrong she proposes to Dennis and he gladly accepts.

However, preparing for the wedding turns disastrous. Denis seems more interested with the wedding planner than Charlene. Stephanie seems into a deeper funk because her mom is marrying before she is. Then there is Jake, who makes it clear that he is he one who should be her groom not Dennis. Can a marriage take much more of a spiral downward than this mess that Charlene wants to escape from before she goes insane.

THE WEDDING PARTY is an amusing romantic romp that slowly develops the cast so that the audience understands everyone�s reactions and actions. Once the characters� motivations are established, the plot turns into a wild humorous ride down the aisle. Fans of contemporary craziness will want to attend Charlene�s wedding reception as the story line has several additional subplots augmenting a delightfully funny novel.

Harriet Klausner

Okay I am a huge Robyn Carr fan, but this was not my favorite read. The book had some nice twist and turns and touched on a subject many of us fear, Alzheimers, but for some reason I had to make myself finish it.

I was so excited to read this book that I started reading it as soon as I got it and then began to frown a little, then more, then realized I was frowning so much because the heroine was not only irritating, but she was flaky and cold. I got about 100 pages in and was wondering when it was going to pick up finally and the again realized that the book was 377 pages. It should've been very involved at this point, but all I got was bored and confused.
Confused because the jumbled plot was filled with too many people all talking at once and information into their lives when they had nothing to do with the story, or, the 'wedding party'. What party? There was no funny and quirky wedding party with crazy characters that will make me laugh until I ache or touching moments where I sigh and shake my head. Too much insight into the main character Charlene's friend's life, Pam and Charlene's 25 year old daughter Samantha. Also more looks into the lives of a single mother's life whom Charlene is representing in court, a couple that is divorcing, her ex-husband, her elderly mother,her present boyfriend and future husband Dennis-with whom we're supposed to see in the wedding party as the groom, ha!, Dennis's dead wife, his sister...I can go on. My point is, is it too confusing. Too many plot developments that lead nowhere.
In short, this story was supposed to be about, and I stress the word 'supposed' because it came nowhere near it; a 45 year old woman who is sucessful at being a family lawyer and is happy with every part of her life, even with the long-term relationship she has with her boyfriend who is a doctor. The problem comes in when her daughter says she doesn't want to end up like her, single and alone and then her mother seems to be losing her mind when she gets lost in a grocery store parking lot and to top things off her ex still loves her and says she can't commit. To fix the problem she decides she wants to marry Dennis,(the doctor boyfriend).
This is where we're supposed to have the wedding party, but we don't. The entire book is a mix of her life's setbacks and letdowns and how she hated her father and how he caused her to shrug off relationships. How her fiance is her 'rock' and her staunchest supporter, but he starts an affair with the wedding cordinater. She doesn't seem to care either way. Her spoiled daughter gets way too much time in the book and we were introduced to her boyfriend Grant too late.
All in all, we are faced with a flaky 45 year old heroine who is having some sort of mid-life crisis and it definately isn't funny, lol, a spoiled 25 year old daughter who is just as flaky, a quirky ex husband whom we never really understand, a cheating doctor fiance and an elderly mother who keeps upsetting Charlene. I am still waiting for the 'hysterical wedding fiasco' that I was promised on the jacket back... save your money on this one....
Tracy Talley~@

If you enjoy ensemble comedy with a wide cast of characters, you will find a lot to appreciate in this riotous book. Charlene, the 45-year-old heroine, finds a host of obstacles in the way when she attempts a long-avoided walk down the aisle with her boyfriend of five years, including: her mom going off the deep end, her daughter angsting about growing old and ending up alone like her mom, her fiancé hanging out far too much with the wedding planner, and the her sexy ex husband stepping forward with the craziest behavior of all, a demand for another chance.
Robyn Carr keeps a lot of balls in the air with this story, but all the colorful characters and their competing needs add excellently to the frenetic pace which is a main source of the book's humor. The various story lines leap and skitter, ultimately feeding into each other for a strong climax. In addition, the romance with Charlene's ex husband is sexy and adds a lot to the humor as well. I also really appreciated encountering a well-lived-in older heroine for a change.

While this was a good book, I would definitely *not* categorize it as a romantic comedy. So if you are looking for something light and funny, there are plenty of (other) authors to try. I would categorize this book, rather, as an issue-based contemporary romance - sort of women's fiction, if you will.

I liked this book. I like Ms. Carr's writing style, it's light, easy to read, and she has the gift of making her characters seem real. But while the writing is light, the issues she explores are not. So this is a hard-to-categorize book - light reading because of the easy-to-read style, but heavy reading because of the many characters and heavy issues that they are dealing with.

I found that while I didn't particularly like the heroine, Charlene, I found myself liking her a lot more at the end, when she finally gets all the pieces of her life together and realizes where she went wrong in the way she was living her life, and looking back, says to herself - I know I made a lot of mistakes, but they were inevitable at the time - and I think that that's very, very realistic. Yes, that's real life - most of us haven't figured everything out at twenty (like some Regency heroines seem to do), but rather, we figure things out slowly, bumblingly, just like the heroine did.

I happened to have really liked Grant, her daughter Stephanie's boyfriend. I know that we don't get to know him too well, because we don't get to see him too much - but isn't that just the point, isn't that what Stephanie is upset about as well. But I do like the way he's sure of himself, knows where he's going and what he's planning on doing with his life, unlike Stephanie? And Grant is a hero through and through, even to the end - when he said good-bye, it was a classy good-bye (I'll pay your rent until you figure out what you want to do), I thought he was very mature, and I liked him. (By the way, don't you think it's funny the way they keep on insisting what a *wonderful* job they did raising their daughter when it's so obvious she's a little screwed up?)

I also really liked Jake - I sometimes felt like shaking Charlene at how she was treating him, isn't it great to have someone so in love with you that he stays around even after the divorce - and she treats him like dirt, and he still loves her...

I wouldn't give this book five stars, it wasn't great riveting reading, but on the other hand I did enjoy it, and I really liked the ending, I think it wrapped things up very well. I would even say that the ending bumped up this book from being a three-star pleasant read, to a four star, better than average read.

I love Robyn Carr's books and always look for the next one. I really liked this book as it was funny and cute. Poor Charlene deciding all of a sudden to get married when no one else expects it. Maybe others know better about things than she does?

Whenever I review these types of fiction, romance novels, I really try to bear in mind that that's what they are: fiction. So if the story line is completely unbelievable to me I always remind myself that maybe it's not supposed to be. However, I do appreciate a story that I could imagine as somewhat real. This definitely wasn't one of them.

I read it in one day at the beach. It's an entertaining book to relax on the beach with or pass time on the train. As other reviewers have stated there were way too many characters and plots. I found the story with Dennis and Agatha completely unbelievable and ridiculous, Peaches was annoying and her story, as well as Pam's and Merrie's, had nothing to do with a "wedding party." In fact there were so many times that the plot ran askew from anything to do with a wedding! I feel like only at the end did anything get resolved or have anything to do with the wedding. It actually might have been the second to last chapter in which the wedding party met for lunch to discuss the wedding, for the first time ever. Which is fine but don't title a book "the wedding party" if it really has nothing to do with a wedding party.

This book was not horrible it was okay. I mean, after all I did read the entire thing in one day.

What I really enjoyed about it was that it was about an older, successful woman. Not your usual young woman that ends up with a man that helps take care of her in the end....Couldn't give it a 5 star because it was choppy in some parts, characters who were suppose to be so dedicated and steady (Dennis) found himself quickly attracted to the wedding planner. Hoping there will be a sequel that is about her associate (Pam) and her younger man!!!

Unlike a couple of these negative reviewers, I actually read the book. From cover to cover. In two days. And Charlene's daughter is named Stephanie. And her boyfriend is a physician's assistant, not a doctor. But maybe I'm just used to reading nice, long books and keeping a variety of characters straight--Carr's special gift. Obviously not a gift shared by some of these reviewers...

This might be my favorite Robyn Carr book yet; it's certainly a bit lighter than some of the others (no domestic violence, for one thing). Charlene decides to get married, but to the wrong man. Charlene's mother is losing her mind, and her daughter is a spoiled brat. The men in this book are virtually all heroes; they just need to be matched up with the right women. Which, of course, takes 377 entertaining pages to work out. The only problem with Carr's books is that I keep finishing them!

While this wasn't a favorite of mine, it had some good points. The theme of evaluating one's life and identifying important decisions and the unconscious motivations behind them was insightfully explored. However, I thought there were inconsistencies in the character development. For example, without spoiling a specific moment, Charlene is devoted to her career yet fails to be thorough on occasion. Some of the decisions of the characters led me to lack the ability to identify with them or sympathize with them. This was one of those books that reminds me of 80s television, with its emphasis on modern lives and high-powered careers. Being a person who values work/life balance, it wasn't for me.

A good story of growing old, growing up, new and old romances,and finding out that love just happens. Sometimes love is fresh and new and other times it's like an old comfortable friend. Senior moments happen whether we're ready for them or not, how we deal with them is what's important.

definitely a different book of several related people and their lives, present and past that affected their futures.. At times, very amusing and at other interesting law tidbits.
A look at what may seem to be what you want and don't want may not be the right thing.
A must for all love book fans

This book is NOT part of the Virgin River Series. It is a stand alone and it is delightful. Highly recommended but Jack's Bar is nowhere to be found between it's covers. the store should be more careful with the write ups to be sure of accuracy.

The title does not characterize the book. I was expecting something more light hearted. But it deals with many different issues, and people coming to grips with their lives. From Charlene with her boyfriend Dennis, to Charlene's daughter Stephanie and her ex, to her mother Lois, to her assistant Pam. All learning to copy with what life has dealt them. It hit very close to home for me, so I found it very emotional. If you are looking for a light hearted book this is not for you. But even though I found it at times intense, it was a well written book, wish I found it a couple of years ago.