This is Book 9 in the Chic Manila series but, according to author Mina V. Esguerra, can be read as a standalone.
Daphne Cardenas is the best wedding planner around, and everyone knows it. That’s why her friend Greg hired her as an emergency replacement one month before his wedding—because he fears his fiancée Helen is falling for the guy they first hired for the job.
Aaron Trinidad is new to the wedding industry but years of conference planning and loads of charm make him good at it. Really good at it. Planning the wedding of his friend Helen should be easy, and it is. To be unceremoniously fired isn’t good for his new career, but the chance to learn from the best might be the silver lining.
Aaron and Daphne have chemistry, but there’s history with Helen that at least one other person considers a threat. Who’s the planner who can fix this impending disaster?
Buy on Amazon: bit.ly/chicmanila9
$1.99 pre-order price until April 30 / $2.99 starting May 1 / Free on Kindle Unlimited
Goodreads page: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34629572-better-at-weddings-than-you
Cover design by Tania Arpa, photography by Alexandra Urrea. The photo comes from one of the shoots for #romanceclasscovers project, providing romance-cover photos with Filipino models. (More about that project here: instagram.com/romanceclasscovers)
Interviewed Mina regarding weddings, and here are her (kilig) answers:
What is it about attending/participating in weddings you love/hate?
I love the dressing up, and the reception haha. Especially once I got married myself and experienced planning my own wedding. I liked looking at the menu in weddings I attended after, and figuring out how decisions were made, like why this, not that. I remember deeply disliking that part where the single women were “rounded up” and made to do things. I timed my bathroom visits right then, and I promised myself I wouldn’t do that to my friends. (I didn’t!)
What are the most nightmarish things that could happen to a wedding
- If you were the organizer
Something weather related, or a medical emergency. Still you could prepare for it, but you don’t want it to happen.
- If you were the bride
Same! I’ve seen weddings where little things or big things don’t go according to plan but it doesn’t ruin the vibe of the day at all.
If there was anything in your wedding ceremony that you could change/relive, which one/s would that/those be?
I would have eaten more. I loved the menu but there was so much going on and I wasn’t hungry during the actual wedding! Also, we brought in a table for 12 for our friends but they were led to a table for 10. They made it work, but when I found out that it happened during the reception I was like UGH HOW DID THIS HAPPEN.
If you were my wedding organizer, how would you ‘design’ a wedding ceremony between me and uhm… my dream fictional groom David Gandy? I like the color blue, lavender blooms and stargazer lilies. 😃
Definitely a small destination wedding for the two of you. By the beach (but not really on the beach, because wind and sand). Special blue-colored cocktails, grilled seafood, real flowers on the layered cake. You’ll both be gone from the reception before the end of the night but that’s OK, we’ll understand.
Looking around, being with people, I see the extreme importance of learning all you can while you can, especially life skills. Learn these skills not because you should not need to seek help from others, but because the reality is, there won’t always be others who will have the patience for you, who you can rely on, who is willing to be at your disposal. Learn all you must because you don’t want to be a sad, limp individual who can’t advance because you chose to believe there’s always someone to get you out of your rut and clean up your mess for you.
