Posts Tagged ‘APW Book’

Dec 2011

Final Update (for now): 5:00 PM PST

Hi all! I realized people were wondering why I wasn’t updating. It wasn’t that I was out celebrating (though I will be soon), but that the book ranking has held steady at #29 on Amazon for hours (which, in itself is amazing) so I didn’t have crazy stats to update you on. I will say though that we ended the day as #1 in Movers and Shakers, #9 in Hot New Releases (whoa, right), and #1 and #2 in weddings (paper, and Kindle). Let’s hope that’s the beginning of a sea change in how weddings are thrown in this country, no?

It’s been overwhelming and crazy and thrilling, and I hope it matters for more than today. I hope it matters in how we all think about community, support, and economies, and I hope it matters a bit for weddings. Because to quote the Caitlin Moran interview I was watching last night, to calm myself the f*ck down, “I do, a bit, want to totally change the world.”

But before we call it a night, Other Meg, she of La Vie En Rose Events in New York (brand new APW sponsor) would like to give four of you who couldn’t afford the book copies. She says:

The spirit of the APW community is so effing inspiring every day and even more so today! I can’t tell you how many times as a wedding planner I have reiterated APW wisdom to my clients (or pissy mothers). Or how many times I’ve referred to APW to reassure myself that I’m not the only one who thinks this way (we can’t all be batshit crazypants, right?).

So, in the combined spirits of gratitude & paying it forward while indulging my shopaholic tendencies, WHO NEEDS A BOOK? I’ve been a budgeted to the pennies bride to be, so I know there must be folks out there dying to break their spending embargoes. So, I want to buy 4 more copies for the first 4 people to email me shipping info to laverevents (at) gmail.

So clearly, take her up on that, now!

And the darling and emotional A Girl, one of the ladies who held my hand through all of this, had this to say (she burst into tears in the UK when the book hit #29):

As this day winds to a close I’m left feeling somewhat drained, but exhilarated, heart bursting with pride for this new, best-selling creation and the friend who conceived it and willed it into being over many long months. As part of the extended APW sisterhood, I’d like to believe that if ever it was possible for a book to have a bevy of doting aunties, it would be this one, and then how incredibly honoured would I be to feel part of the awe-inspiring community that helps to raise it.

I don’t have anything more coherent to add at this juncture, though I’ll try to put things into words somewhat properly tomorrow afternoon, when I write about the eleventh month of self employment. Till then, I leave you with a heart full of love, and a deeply marvelous Wedding Graduate coming your way in the morning. Because doing our job, that’s how we roll…

And please, don’t get me wrong. If you want to buy the book and haven’t yet, please do. For all that this feels like the end of something big, it’s just the beginning. The book isn’t even OUT yet! So, onward and upward.

Now, off to drink a whole lot of expensive tequila.

Love, love, and more love,

Meg

Update #5: 2:00 PM PST

Um, it turns out, A Practical Wedding: Creative Solutions for Planning a Beautiful, Affordable, and Meaningful Celebration is now a top thirty book on Amazon. We just hit #29. The real reason this is mindblowing, not only given that it’s the holidays and 3/4ths of the books bought this year will be bought this month… or something totally crazy like that… But. Once you get into the top levels of the Best Seller list, headwinds are against you. They give weight to sales over the past month, not just sales over the past day, and the numbers sold get really, really high.

That said, we’re nine slots away from being on the front page of the Amazon Best Seller List. Which? Is crazy. Is totally, totally, totally crazy for a first time author without any mainstream press clout. It currently looks like this:

I, for one, am totally shell shocked. And getting close to ready to break out the champagne. I’m so grateful and overwhelmed, I’m not even sure how to process this. But I’m going to try. Thank you guys, again.

Update #4: 1:15 PM PST

You guys! Things are happening so fast that I’m literally forgetting to update everyone because I’m so boggled. We hit 34 on Amazon. THIRTY F*CKING FOUR. Do you know how hard that is? OVER THE HOLIDAYS? Then I found out we hit #82 on Amazon in Canada. That’s the top 100 IN TWO COUNTRIES. I know. Then my wonderful editor called from New York, sounding totally giddy.

And a special shout out to David Malki of Wondermark, whom I’ve known so long I don’t know how long it’s been (elementary school sometime), from whom we blatantly stold the APW book buy idea, for being awesome, and tweeting about it.

I took a shower, and then all this happened, and now I need to get dressed. And maybe eat. IT IS CRAZY AROUND HERE TODAY.

I love you guys. This is all you.

Update #3: 11:50 AM PST

You guys. We’re THE MOVER AND SHAKER (link fixed!) on Amazon. For all of Amazon. As my friend Marie-Eve just said, “Never underestimate the power of community.”

Update #2: 11:30 AM PST

You guys, we have cracked the Amazon Bestseller list, with the APW book coming in at #96. No wait, I am updating this as I’m typing it…. A Practical Wedding: Creative Solutions for Planning a Beautiful, Affordable, and Meaningful Celebration is at #63. WHAT? Do you have any idea how hard that is to do in the holiday season? Lemmie just clear that up for you: it’s hard. The book is also #17 in Hot New Releases (I sh*t you not, I just beat Bill Clinton’s book. That is possibly the single craziest fact in my day so far, as a die hard political junkie), #1 Craft/Hobbies/Home (getting married is a craft!), and #1 in wedding releases. YOU GUYS DID THIS.

Because good news tends to follow good news, I got a call from my publisher, while I was at the gym, a minute before I found out that we’d broken through to the bestseller list to find out good news about not one, but TWO stops of the APW book tour. More on that when… there is more on that… but good things are finally happening in an area of promotion, that I was worried about.

So, all you afternoon readers of APW, of which there are many of you… it’s up to you to push this thing over the top. (Is it even possible to push it over the top from here? I honestly don’t even know.) But it’s up to you, if we want to try. If you’re just getting a break in your day, or have been pondering placing an order today but were not totally sure… you can make this thing happen.

Nothing but gratitude. Now I should probably get out of my gym clothes…. off to do that.

Update #1: 7:40 AM PST

Good morning you guys! Last week, A Practical Wedding: Creative Solutions for Planning a Beautiful, Affordable, and Meaningful Celebration (whatever, I can say my own full book title as often as I want, no??) was number 233,000 on Amazon. Last night we were 30,000 (which means people-who-were-not-you-guys were buying it this week, eeep).

As of right now, early on this west coast morning, we’re number 659 on Amazon. And that’s even in Holiday book buy season! Profound heartfelt thanks to those of you that ordered it this morning, and to those of you who haven’t yet… EEEP! I think we can push this book to the top 100 list, and you get to be the ones that do it.

I’m overwhelmed and excited. I’m going to go gallop a mile or so to get it all out, and then I’ll report back.

DOIN’ IT,

MEG

****

Here We Go…

This is happening… NOW. The goal for the day is to all pitch in together (Including me! I’m totally playing! If you write a book, it makes the best Christmas present, right?) and push A Practical Wedding: Creative Solutions for Planning a Beautiful, Affordable, and Meaningful Celebration up the Amazon Best Seller list for a day (hint: also, the wedding bestseller list is right here if you want to peek at that).

For the uninitiated, the book will hold your hand through wedding planning from start to finish, in a logical this-is-the-plan way that the blog can’t. Plus you can hand this to your mother (or partner, or best girlfriend, or dad) to get her to understand where you’re coming from. If you’re already married, it’s a great gift for your engaged girlfriends… or you can just buy it to support the site. (Fun fact: If this book does well, my chances of writing a post-wedding book are exponentially increased. And we all want that, amiright?)

So, while we’re focusing on Amazon today, please feel free to pre-order it from your preferred seller:

Amazon
Barnes & Noble
Indie Bound (which helps support brick and mortar bookstores near you)

A few thoughts for the worriers:

While the book is on pre-order, and its technical publication date is January, it shipped from the publisher’s warehouse yesterday. If you order it now, you should get it in one and a half or two weeks, in time for Christmas gifts.
The way Amazon counts, we probably only have a chance of pushing the paper version of the book up the Amazon US Best Seller list (though, I suppose you never know).
But: what really matters to me over the long run is that you buy the book, read it, like it, tell your friends about it, tell your local indie bookstore about it, review it online, and generally enjoy it. Pushing the book up a best seller list will last for a day or so, but you buying and loving the book is what lasts forever. So, buy the book the way you want to buy the book. (Kindle! Indie book store! In the UK!) I’ll be super grateful that you did.

Let’s do this.

You may now buy the book!

Picture: The book dedication. Personal for A Practical Wedding.

Posted in: Entrepreneurship, Meg's Thoughts | 515 Comments »

Dec 2011

The Great APW Book Buy Starts Tomorrow

Dear Team Practical,

It occurs to me that I’ve been writing you these letters for a long time, and the whole time I’ve been writing them, I wanted to write a book. And suddenly, here we are. Tomorrow, starting at 3:00 am PST, a post will go up reminding you that it’s time for The Great APW Book Buy. Then, at some point, I’ll wake up over here in California, look at the Amazon stats, and start live blogging about the whole process. I wish I could tell you I was just excited, but honestly, I’m a bit scared.

Right now, I feel like I’m standing at the edge of the cliff. For those of you who have seen the new Muppet movie (see the new Muppet movie!) I’m definitely Fozzie, wrapped in a blanket in a hammock asking Kermit, “Are we going to be ok, Kermit?” Obviously, David is Kermit. I might not sleep that much in my little hammock tonight.

Ever since I started writing APW, I wanted to write a wedding book with my particular perspective. A sane book. A mildly irreverent book. A book that told you it was ok to do what you wanted, but you also had to respect other people’s feelings. A book inspired by all the Miss Manners books I giggled over as a small child lying at the bottom of a very large bookshelf, but with how-to instructions on how to actually get the job done. A book with some proper wedding history included. A book that told you how to get to the other side with grace and with your dignity and savings more or less intact. I wanted to write the book I really needed when I was planning.

All this is to say, A Practical Wedding: Creative Solutions for Planning a Beautiful, Affordable, and Meaningful Celebration (don’t buy it till tomorrow!) really matters to me. That’s been the difficult part of the last few weeks, realizing that the book really matters, and I actually care how it sells, and I actually care if it helps people, and I really want to get it out into the world. It would be so much easier if I didn’t care that much. But I suppose that good things are never easy.

But it’s also been a great few weeks, watching the book take its first tentative steps into the world. I cried when I read Alyssa’s review of the book. Because you guys, she actually really liked it (I did not bribe her to say any of that). And I wrote the damn book, so I had no idea if it was good or not by the time all was said and done. I just knew that in that moment, I’d done my best.

And now it’s up to you. It’s hard for me to let go, and know that I’ve done everything I can do, and that I have to entrust this to your hands, and just let it fly, but here we are. It’s the eve of The Great APW Book Buy Day, and this is where we are. I can tell you that if everyone who read this site (both on RSS and on the regular site) today bought a book today, we’d probably make the New York Times bestseller list. But I also know that’s not a realistic goal, and I’m a realist. So what I do think we can do, for sure, is push the book up the Amazon bestseller list tomorrow. It’s the holiday season, so it’s going to be tricky, but that much I think we can do. And is it possible we’ll do more? Maybe. Who knows. But right now I’m grateful to each of you that buys a book, tells a friend about it, writes an online review, asks a bookstore about it, gives it to your friend getting married, gives it to your mom to calm her down, or just reads it. I’m so profoundly grateful, in advance.

So, while I’ll give final instructions in the post tomorrow, basically what I have to say it this: if you’re going to buy the book, buy it in the way that works for you, and don’t stress out about it. That is more than enough. I’ll be doing the same. My author discount is only a little less than the Amazon price, so I’m going to buy my own book on Book Buy Day, just because I can.

Oh. And the picture on this post. I wasn’t going to share this because One Love Photo captured a super personal emotional moment. But then I thought, yes, I should share it. This is me, looking at my book, pondering the fact that it got born at all. Here we go.

With Gratitude (and only a tiny bit of terror),

Meg

Photo: One Love Photo

Posted in: Entrepreneurship, Meg's Thoughts | 82 Comments »

Dec 2011

Maddie’s APW Book Review

As a long-time reader of APW who has been married for over two years, I’ll admit, I wasn’t really sure what I was going to get from the APW book (don’t buy it till tomorrow!). I mean, hello, I’m a seasoned veteran here, folks. I already got married, I work for APW, and I photograph weddings for a living. What do you think you’re going to tell me about weddings, Meg, that I don’t already know?

And then I read the book. And I was blown away.

Within the first ten pages of the book I was crying in the waiting room of a Subaru Service Center mourning the wedding-planning experience I can never have because this book wasn’t around during my engagement. Oh the easily avoidable family drama! The DIY projects that never should-have-been! The time I cried in the car about sparklers!

What the APW book does differently from every other wedding book, blog, or magazine out there is it actually removes things from your to-do list rather than adding to it. Meg isn’t trying to convince you to buy more, do more, spend more. She just wants to make sure that the things you’re buying, doing, and spending on mean something to you. Did you just read that? It’s wedding literature that gives a shit that you’re a person. Novel.

But, back to why this book matters to you. The part that is going to blow you away. Are you ready? The APW book is the only wedding literature you’ll ever read that actually saves you money (and not in a “follow these tips to get 10% off a bunch of crap we just convinced you that you need,” kind of way). Trying to figure out how to cut costs but are tired of people telling you to eliminate guests? Go buy the book. Can’t figure out why your totally reasonable budget is suddenly too small for the wedding world? Seriously, go buy the book. Still fighting with your mom because she thinks you need chair covers? Yeah, just go buy the book. And then buy another copy for your mom.

It’s hard to put into words, but what the APW book provides for weddings (and if I’m being honest here, life) is that it gives a freedom to care about the things that matter, to cross off things that don’t, and the WIC-free wisdom to know the damn difference.

Now, I’m sure that some of you probably don’t believe me. Of course, it’s so easy to say these things now that I’m married and the wedding itself is far behind me. But as I read the book, I steadily ticked off a mental checklist of all the money and stress I could have saved if I’d had Meg’s book while planning my wedding. And let me tell you, it is worth the investment. Allow me to demonstrate:

Wedding Costs I Could Have Avoided:

Gocco Printer – $400
DIY Invitation Supplies – $100
First Wedding Dress – $100
DIY Flowers (that died) – $300

Total: $900

Cost of Meg’s Book:

A Practical Wedding (Book) – $10.88 on Amazon (Don’t buy it till tomorrow! Seriously people!)

Total: $10.88

Savings: $889.12

More importantly, I was able to make a list of all the emotional headaches that were completely unnecessary but somehow seemed so unavoidable at the time, such as:

The fight we had about sparklers and their relative safety to our guests

The time my mom and I fought about earrings

The time my mom and I fought about my ever-growing DIY projects

The week I spent not sleeping because I had to make my own invitations

The midnight photoshoot for our save-the-dates that I insisted must be done immediately, or else

The time I spent feeling bad about these things when I should have just let myself off the hook and moved on

etc.

And if that’s not enough to convince you, maybe we can talk about something else that’s important—the fact that the wedding world is kind of out to get us. Between the reality TV shows, the magazines, and the blogs, the wedding industry makes us out to be both the victims and the villains of our own wedding stories. We’re either doing Too Much or Not Enough and we can never win. And the industry is making boatloads of money off our insecurity. But this book, this monumental labor of love, it doesn’t want that for you. It gives you the power to own your wedding, to make it something that is meaningful, joyful, respectful—and that’s powerful. In fact, I’m surprised the wedding industry even allows this book to exist, that’s how much it challenges the commonly-held notions about what weddings are supposed to be. And that, my friends, is something worth celebrating.

Which is why, even though I’ve already read it, I’m going to buy a few copies for my clients and my newly or soon-to-be engaged friends tomorrow. It’s time we reclaim the word “wedding,” and I can’t think of a better way to do it than by taking this book to the top.

Photo by One Love Photo. Read all the posts on writing the APW book here. The APW Book Buy is tomorrow!

Posted in: Uncategorized | 26 Comments »

Dec 2011

Alyssa’s APW Book Review

Dear Meg,

I just finished your book, A Practical Wedding: Creative Solutions for Planning a Beautiful, Affordable, and Meaningful Celebration. I’m really honored that I’m the fourth person to read it, after Kate, who edited it, so isn’t exactly a reader; David who you forced to read it and is married to you, so practically doesn’t count; and your publisher who obviously is a business not a person. So I’m the first person to read it, I think, technically! I WIN! You know what a voracious reader I am, so it’s exciting to read something before anyone else has a chance! Did I mention I was technically the very first reader? I am.

Now that I’m done, I have to say…

I’m pissed.

You and David dated for what, five years? I respect your choice to wait until it felt right, it’s a mature decision and blah blah blah… whatever, this is about me. And my problem is that you both waited so long to get engaged and then married that your wedding date is just a month before mine. Therefore, it took you two years of wedded bliss before you wrote this book and had it published. And that’s two years too late to help me.

Quite frankly, I find that damn inconsiderate.

I mean, really. You start off, right there in the introduction, where you set the stage for the whole book. (As people do in introductions…) You talk about all the pressures that brides feel from all sides: the expectations, the industry pressure, the just general insanity that surrounds weddings. You let us know that you’ve been there, you know women who’ve been there, and they’ve all made it through. You set the tone for the reader to know that this book is for her and that it understands her and her partner. Now where the hell was that when I was planning, huh?

Also, throughout each chapter, there are quotes from real brides and real readers of APW, discussing the topic and giving their viewpoint. It’s like you’re letting us be a part of a bigger conversation—it’s not just you sitting there telling us what to do. It’s you, plus everyone else, cheering us on and letting us in on tips and tricks. For nearly every possible outcome, you have a bride going, “Yup, we did this. It worked out swell.” When I was planning, I mostly had people telling me what I couldn’t do, and here you are letting new brides know that they can do pretty much anything they want? Rude.

Next, you have bullet points throughout the book, summing up each chapter. Now that’s just a slap in the face. You know how much I love bullet points! I write Ask Team Practical with bullet points before I flesh them out! It’s like you’re purposely mocking me with your fancy asides and chapter recaps.

The other thing is that the book is actually researched! There are quotes! And acknowledgments! And historical perspectives! And not only that, it’s funny! You say f*ck and make things fun! Most wedding books I had were dry single-opinions from women very far removed from their wedding day, or breezy and anecdotal pieces of fluff bolstered by pretty drawings of brides with waspish waists, running around with veils and cartoon sweat drops surrounding their heads. How dare you write a book that’s in-between, one that appeals to the rest of us?!?

Finally, there’s the admittance of things that most wedding books and websites don’t even cover. You devote not one, but two chapters to it; one on the crying and fighting that might occur during your wedding planning and then a final chapter on what happens after you get married. You even bring up stuff that we don’t like to admit, like the “I’m going to f*cking kill you” moment that can happen when a friend or relative pushes you a little too far. Where the f*ck was this on my wedding day?!? Typical wedding books devote a page or two to this, at most. It would have done so much more good for me to know that I should just take a breath and walk away, not internalize it and then feel guilty later about not acting like a “bride” on my wedding day. Why did you do this to me???

*sigh*

Fine.

You know what? I’m happy for you.

I’m happy for you and your stupid book and your stupid Great APW Book Buy and all the stupid readers that will be able to use this at their stupid wedding and have a better time because of it. I hope that you’re all happy with all the advice and knowledge that I didn’t have on my wedding day. Yes, it was one of the happiest days of my life, but the time leading up to it could have been better if you weren’t so damn selfish.

I hope you’re pleased with yourself.

-Alyssa

P.S. My mom wants an autographed copy because I’m on page 8. Can you swing that for me?

Photo by One Love Photo. Read all the posts on writing the APW book here. The APW Book buy is on Wednesday!

Posted in: Uncategorized | 58 Comments »

Nov 2011

The Great APW Book Buy!

Yesterday we talked about the go-getter nature of dreams. And this morning, before we dive headfirst into weddings again, I wanted to talk a little bit about the dream I’ve had since I started this site—the dream that’s coming true next month: writing a book. But more than that, I wanted to talk about how (contrary to what we all wish was true) nothing about dreams is easy.

I wanted to write my book from month one of wedding planning. Because the truth is, with a few exceptions listed over here, the wedding book market is pretty bereft of sanity. When I was getting hitched, I really wanted a sane and funny how-to manual that walked me through the craziness of wedding planning, gave me logistical and emotional tips for managing through it, and made me laugh. I wanted a wedding planning book for normal people, so since what I wanted didn’t exist, I wrote one. And it’s coming out next month. Oh my god.

Almost three years ago, I wrote this about the need for better books on the wedding shelf:

This weekend, David and I went to a bookstore and somehow ended up sitting on the floor in the wedding section going through piles and piles of wedding books… Laughing at the wedding industry has it’s own punishment. Namely, it’s really really funny until suddenly it’s horrifying.

So there we were, sitting in the bookstore, reading wedding advice back and forth, and suddenly I started feeling really ill. Not, “Oh, this is making me nauseous, ha, ha, ha!” but more, “Oh dear God I’m going to lose it.” I think it was right after I had read a tip to David about how “It is critical to think of your wedding as an enormous theatrical event,” and while he was reading me a tip about how “Many brides waste literally thousands of their gift dollars by failing to register for the most lucrative items, forcing them to buy these items after the fact.”

Cue: nausea.

This bridal book hilarity (or lack there of) haunted me all weekend. Over and over what kept running through my head was “Garbage in, garbage out.” We went through almost every bridal book on the shelf, and almost every single one was explicit instructions on how to be a needy, self absorbed, demanding, obsessive bride.

So I wrote the book that I wished was on that shelf. And I believe in it. And now my job is to get it into the hands of people who need it. And, frankly, into your hands, because I owe the book to you. I mean, it was a good idea for a book, sure. But the way the publishing industry works, I had to be able to point to the whole APW community and say, “They believe in this. They will make this go,” before anyone else would believe in the book. Which brings me back to what I was pondering yesterday: dreams are important. Figuring out what we want and vowing to change our lives is important. But we can’t do any of it unless we’re ready to lift each other up. And that is something that the APW community is so profoundly good at that it blows my mind every single day. So I’m pretty convinced we can do this.

Last year, when I was still working full time and trying to make a million changes in my life at once, never ever getting down time, I wrote a post called Pulling On The Boots. I said:

I’d forgotten what it was like to knock on door after door after door and get told no, over and over again. I’d forgotten how depressing it was. I’d forgotten how determined it can make you. I’d forgotten that confusing, partially excited, mostly terrified feeling that you get in the pit of your stomach when someone finally says yes. I’d almost forgotten that art is my hustle.

But over these last few weeks, I’ve remembered. I’ve felt the instantaneous swoop of despair you feel at “no.” I’d felt the confusing terror of “yes.”

And while I couldn’t be clear about it at the time, what I was talking about was the process of trying to sell a book. Because let me finally come right out and say this: even with a proposal I was proud of and an awesome agent who I trusted, there was a period of time where I thought the book wasn’t going to sell. Why? Well. In short, it’s easier for people to say no to you than to say yes. You have to give them a really good reason to say yes, and there are times that can feel completely impossible.

When we were pitching the book, we heard a mixture of, “Oh, all the wedding books have already been written,” (which, had that been true, would have been a sad state of affairs) and, “Everyone just wants a traditional wedding, so this is the kind of book no one wants” (which sites like APW, East Side Bride, Offbeat Bride, and The Broke Ass Bride disprove every damn day). So it was such an awesome gift to find my editor Katie at a major house, who had never bought a wedding book in her whole career, and who got the book right away.

But the funny thing is, now that the book is written, I’ve realized it’s time to convince people to say yes all over again. As we’re starting to market the book, we’re hearing the same message, “Our people are not wedding people.” (As my friend Robin said, most people are not wedding people till they suddenly are wedding people, and that’s when they need a sane wedding book.) Or, “People getting married just want traditional wedding books.” Which. Obviously no.

So. Today is the beginning of us turning a no into a yes. It’s the beginning of us proving that people do, in fact, want sane wedding books, and that we’re reclaiming this whole wedding nonsense. This is the plan:

The Great APW Book Buy

Inspired by David Malki (click that link, the story is hilarious) who writes the web comic Wondermark (we grew up together, funny enough), we’re launching the Great APW Book Buy for December 7th, which is the first day the APW book ships from my publisher’s warehouses. (Side note: book publication is a little weird. My book’s official publication date is January 1, 2012, but those of you who pre-order on Dec 7th will have it in your hands the next week.) The idea is this: it’s actually pretty manageable to push a book up the Amazon bestseller list for a day or so (though we’re going to have to work extra hard to make this happen in the Christmas season) because you only need to sell hundreds of books a day, not thousands, to make this happen.

So! If everyone buys the APW book on the same day (whether you’re buying it for yourself… since it’s dedicated partially to you, or for your mother to calm her down, or for your best friend who’s getting married, or for your wedding clients next year, or for any combination of these reasons), we can push the APW book up the charts, and get some attention for a book by a first time author. We can make the publishing industry take notice and prove that yes, we want more sane weddings and fewer crazy ones. By all working together, you guys can help make this dream happen.

So! The Great APW Book Buy will take place on Wednesday December 7th. We have a countdown clock on the top of the blog as of today (pretty), and you’ll hear more about the book in the next few weeks. Come December 7th, you can order the book through:

Amazon
Barnes & Noble
Indie Bound (which helps you support brick and mortar bookstores near you.)

(BUT DON’T ORDER IT YET!)

I have faith that we can make the APW book a bestseller… if only for a day. And by doing so, we can point out that this is a conversation that needs to be had, and we can help get the book into the hands of people who need it.

Which can only mean one thing, of course. That I’ll finally get to write a non-wedding book, too. One of these days.

Team, can we do this thing? You have my deepest gratitude in advance.

Doin’ it,

Meg

Picture of me & the galley copy of my book by One Love Photo. I love those guys.

Posted in: Entrepreneurship, Meg's Thoughts, Personal Thoughts | 101 Comments »

Oct 2011

APW Book: The Pages

I haven’t talked much about the process of writing the APW Book since I finished it in early June, and I wanted to catch you up. This summer has been a slow back and forth of edits between me, my editor, and the proofreaders. When I finished the book, I was borderline terrified of the editorial process. First off, I’d found writing the book to be relatively painless, so I figured the other shoe had to drop sooner or later. And secondly, I generally operate in an industry where everything I write is viewed as “problematic,” so I figured it would be just the same with book writing. Let me explain…

As much as the wedding industry and I are not buddy-buddy, I still operate generally within the wedding industry. I’ve built a little bubble of safe space here at APW, but I still know that by saying over and over that you don’t have to buy All The Things, I’m not necessarily making friends. There is a whole industry perpetuating upon you buying All The Things, and who am I to f*ck up that system? Every so often, the wedding industry decides to try to make a friend of me, asks me to do something that seems reasonable… and then inevitable mayhem ensues. Because it quickly becomes clear that my message is not, in fact, the traditional message of, “You really should be sad that you cannot afford All The Things, so here is a plan for you to beg, borrow, or steal cheap replicas of The Things, which will still make you feel terrible because you know that All The Things is the standard. But hey! It’s better than nothing.” Instead my message is, “You don’t need All The Things in the first damn place. Why don’t you have just The Things you actually care about? Or you can have none of The Things if you don’t care about any of them! Just be happy.” Because apparently you can’t sell happiness, so people get very uncomfortable.

So, it was with this re-occurring experience that I went into receiving edits on the book, and I was trepidatious. When I got my first round of edits back in July, I saw a little note from my editor next to my section on “Calling Off Your Wedding,” and I started hyperventilating. They were going to make me cut it, I was sure, because if you call off your wedding, you won’t buy All The Things. But then I read the note and it said, “Great! Maybe we should put this section in a box to highlight it?” And I realized A) That the wedding industry was crazy, and I had post-traumatic stress, and B) I had the best editors in the world. Perseus Books my friends, the largest independent publisher in the US, is full of talented and delightful people who do not care about you purchasing All The Things.

So after my initial fears proved unfounded, the summer’s edits went along swimmingly well. And then suddenly it was September, and I was in Istanbul, and I was receiving the full inside page layouts. It was no longer a manuscript; it was a book. I got the file, and we had to run around Istanbul, in between a baklava outing and the airport, and find a copy center to print the book. At first there was the normal copy center wait, and I sighed to David, “Copy centers… the same the world over.” At which point someone appeared with some tea for each of us while we were waiting, and I drank my words. Never has Kinkos offered me tea with sugar. Then the one man who spoke any English at all was ready to help us. After some gesturing and pointing, we had it worked out, and he cheerfully said, “A4 paper?” and we both sort of stammered and blushed and said, “8.5 X 11? American paper?” You’ve never seen such confused looks. Why is it that we do everything differently than the rest of the world, but in seemingly arbitrary ways? “Right. Well. A4 paper is fine.”

And then we were off to the airport, where I got to look at my book as a book for the very first time. I couldn’t remember what the heck I’d written in it, but half way through the intro I turned to David delighted and said, “This author is funny, and seems so nice. Do you think she’d be friends with me?” He seemed to think she would.

Soon I’ll have book galleys in hand, and we’ll be ready to do this thing. Stay tuned, as I plan a small (self-financed… that’s the way the world works now) book tour, and we get ready to buy the book* all at once in December. Because if you’re not planning a wedding, you always have gifts to give, right? And besides, the book might or might not be dedicated to you. I couldn’t possibly say.

* Funny. Customers who bought my book also bought Caitlin Moran’s How To Be A Woman. Always a sign you’re doing something right. More details on that book club coming later this week.

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