Erin Torneo and Valerie Cabrera Krause are the authors of The Bridal Wave: A Survival Guide to the Everyone-I-Know-is-Getting-Married Years.They applied the "page 69 test" to their book and reported the following:
“Ka-Ching! The Wedding May Be Over, But the Spending Ain’t!”Visit the official site of The Bridal Wave.
That’s the section heading on page 69 of our book. It’s actually pretty representative of what we’re going for with the book overall – a friendly and useful guide for women who are currently in the midst of a Bridal Wave: that time in your life when everyone around you is getting married, except you.
Note the “Ka-Ching!” We tend to use sound effects to drive home our points. This one being part of a chapter entitled “Navigating Wedding Season: From Deciphering the Invite to Dancing the Macarena – How to Enjoy the Fetes Without Racking Up Debts.” As we lead our readers through tips on how to deal with wedding mania, we make a pit stop at the money suck. On page 69 we note that the National Association of Wedding Ministers says that Americans spend approximately $19 billion annually on gifts through wedding registries.
Let’s write that again, just to let it sink in (and because we could only write it once in the actual book).
$19 billion.
Damn. So, the next few pages give some advice about how to dodge the debt that naturally comes with wedding season: creative ideas for gifts, suggestions for saving money, and thoughts on generally keeping your pocketbook – and your sanity – in check during the wedding blitz. We offer a lot of personal stories, too, like how people at weddings can be bawling for all the wrong reasons. (Like when your boyfriend chooses the moment your best friend and her betrothed announce their love to the world to tell you that he doesn’t think long term monogamy “makes sense”.)
Page 69, and the name of the chapter both employ language that aims to say: “Hey, I’m just like one of your friends, and hopefully a pretty funny one, so you should listen to my advice, even though it’s written down on a page instead of spoken out loud from a real live person.” Here are some more examples of that chatty style in other chapter and heading sections that we like:
“I’ve Got Big News – Even My College Roommate with Tourette’s has a Ring! What to do when someone else’s big news means a meltdown for you.”
“Lobrizemized! – When Your Friend Becomes a Bridal Drone: Why it happens and how your friendship can survive her engagement.”
“The League of Concerned Citizens – Everyone from Your Gyno to Your Mom has an Opinion about Your Non-Married Self: Here’s how to shut them up.”
You get our drift. And we think page 69 does too!
Check out the complete list of books in the Page 69 Series.
--Marshal Zeringue
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