TOWN & COUNTRY: Wedding Vows & Promises, by the Editors of Town & Country Magazine, Hearst Books, 2008, $12.95.
Town & Country magazine has long been an expert on social graces for the affluent.
Its latest book, "Wedding Vows & Promises," offers to help couples "find the perfect words for every aspect of a wedding," from invitations to thank-you notes.
The advice, however, teeters between being traditional and downright dated.
Imagine a young man, asking his bride's father for permission to marry, with "Sir, I bow to your parenting skills. You've raised the perfect woman." Even the most aristocratic father would have a hard time keeping a straight face.
Sample wedding invitations and vows categorized by religion are nice touches. There also are beautiful quotes by famous Lebanese poet Khalil Gibran and other writers.
Still, readers may find "Wedding Vows & Promises" as interesting as a great Aunt's vague recollections of her own uninspired wedding.
SOMETHING NEW: Wedding Etiquette for Rule Breakers, Traditionalists, and Everyone in Between, by Elise Mac Adam, Simon Spotlight Entertainment, 2008, $14.95
Let's face it, wedding-etiquette books are often indistinguishable from one other.
That's because many wedding "experts" think only of the conventional bride. But what about the bride who wants to wear a red dress or the groom who just can't part with his jeans on that special day?
Mac Adam, the etiquette columnist for Indiebride.com, believes couples should follow their bliss, and has smart solutions on how they can do it, even if more traditional- minded family and friends are not fans of their nuptials.
In "Something New: Wedding Etiquette for Rule Breakers, Traditionalists and Everyone in Between," Mac Adam covers flowerboys (yes, there is such a thing) bad maids of honor and mothers who just won't take "no" for an answer.
The humorous guide also gives advice on finding the right words for wedding invitations when the groom wants to take the bride's name or how to indicate that a "bride's deceased mother is giving the shower."
There also are tips on how to handle "guests, members of the wedding party, relatives and people who weren't even invited but who would like to have been."
"Something New" is sweet music for the bride who likes to walk to the beat of her own drum.
iDO: Planning Your Wedding With Nothing But 'Net', Simon Spotlight Entertainment, 2008, $16
Christa Terry's entire wedding cost only $11,000.
How did she do it? By planning it all online. Internet savvy or technologically challenged couples can, too, with her "iDo: Planning Your Wedding With Nothing but 'Net."
Terry provides great tips and online resources for busy couples. She urges couples to create their own Web sites, and she lists sites for downloading worksheets and software that will help keep budgets in line.
She even creates her own glossary of wedding acronyms for quick reference. WIC=wedding industrial complex, SO=significant other, MOB=mother of the bride, and STD=save the date ("What did you think STD cards were, anyway?") she asks, impishly.
