Thank you NetGalley, author Katy Birchall, and St. Martin’s Griffin for giving me a free arc of this book in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own!
5 stars
TW: mention of drug overdose
This was my first book by author Katy Birchall and it will not be my last!
This book is about Sophie, who is a professional bridesmaid. She makes a living being the perfect right-hand "friend" of the bride to help them plan for and to make certain their big day happens without any missteps.
Sophie is hired by Lady Victoria Swann, the Marchioness of Meade, in order to help Lady Victoria’s daughter, Cordelia plan her perfect day. While thinking this job will help her to prove how talented she really is, Sophie is excited to take on this bride. But Cordelia is not the typical bride and wants nothing to do with Sophie and her "help," and sets out to make Sophie's job a living nightmare. Not only does Sophie have to content with a bridezilla in Cordelia, but she also finds herself oddly attracted to Cordelia's older brother Tom. As Cordelia's big day is pushed up due to another high profile wedding planned for the same day, can Sophie pull together a dream societal wedding for a reluctant bride, while keeping things professional with Lord Swann?
This book was such a brilliant read! I loved the heartwarming feelings, the joys and mishaps of weddings, friendships, and unexpected love.
The book centered more around the development of Sophie's and Cordelia's relationship than the romantic relationship between Tom and Sophie. So I would not really classify this book as a rom-com, but more of a chick-lit comedy. I was so rooting for the friendship between Cordelia and Sophie. They both were wonderful characters and had a lot of growth throughout this book. I was really unsure about Cordelia at the beginning of this story, but as Sophie and Cordelia continue to work together planning the big day, they both begin to open up to each other and find a true friend in the other. I found myself not excusing Cordelia's behavior, but more understanding her actions due to the betrayals by her friends in the past. Sophie had a wonderful support system in both her family and her other friends. They really helped Sophie to stick with Cordelia and her shenanigans. I really enjoyed seeing how much Cordelia and her fiancé loved each other. '
The other weddings were such fun to read about. There were some really outlandish requests made by the brides, but Sophie was willing to accommodated them, which made for some laugh-out-loud moments.
Sophie and Tom were such an adorable couple. They both had some really sweet yet dorky moments, especially on Sophie's side. I would have liked to see their romance play out a little more. The text messages between the chapters were a great addition to the story. There were defiantly some facepalm test messages sent that had me cringing as well as laughing at the same time. Overall, this book held my interest from start to finish. I would highly recommend this book to those who ever thought planning the big day would be easy! I am looking forward to reading more books by this author!

The romance is not the main focus of this book, as it is more about Sophie and Cordelia's friendship, but I didn't mind that at all! I enjoyed seeing them go from enemies to best friends, and overall I had a great time reading this light and fun story. Sophie and Tom were also very cute, I always like a good friend’s older brother trope!!

This chick lit novel is so much fun! Sophie is a professional bridesmaid—not a wedding planner, but more of a wedding assistant to support the bride and keep her sane during a stressful process. She's hired by the mother of socialite Cordelia to help with the wedding of the season. Except bride Cordelia doesn't want any help, and considers Sophie to be an interference. A battle of wills quickly develops, with Cordelia turning into the world's worst bridezilla to pressure Sophie to quit. But somewhere along the way, the two discover that they're more alike than they think, and maybe what they really need is a friend.

I adore this book. It's fast-paced and funny, with well-developed characters and a strong undercurrent of emotion. I hope there's a sequel featuring Sophie and Tom's story. I'm not sure why this book is called a romance when the romance is barely hinted at—it's not even substantial enough to call it a subplot. If you don't like the term chick lit, you can call it humorous women's fiction—but it's not a romance or a romantic comedy. Calling it that is nothing more than marketing sleight of hand. Though it sometimes delves into serious subjects, the book is uplifting and would make a great beach read.

Thanks, NetGalley, for the ARC I received. This is my honest and voluntary review.

The Secret Bridesmaid by Katy Birchall was a fun and fast read. Sophie Breeze is a wedding planner but she does it while acting as a bridesmaid. Her career is going well until she becomes the bridesmaid to Cordelia Swann, her most challenging bride yet.

The story felt more like chick lit than rom com to me, which worked here. The focus was on Sophie and her growth. Yes, we had mentions of the ex-boyfriend and a future love interest but that was a part of her growth rather than the main plot point. The main focus was the developing friendship between Sophie and Cordelia - and I loved that!

Thanks to NetGalley and St Martin’s Press for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

“Life is one big mess and the world can be really shit. But at a wedding everyone is happy. Everyone is given a few hours of escape from the everyday. How many events can claim that?”

My friend Marissa raves about this book, so when I started to read it, I let her know. She said she was so sad that she already read it. That’s exactly how I feel. I’m so sad I’ve already experienced The Secret Bridesmaid, because this is one I would choose to read again and again as a first time.

This gave me a lot of Carrie Bradshaw Sex and the City. (Especially when she throws her head down on the bar and lifts it back up with the bar mat attached) feels. Sophie is a professional bridesmaid that helps brides on their perfect day. She’s in for a surprise when her newest, and most reluctant client is none other than Lady Cordelia Swann, royalty herself.

I laughed uncontrollably at the customer service emails. Y’all, I did event planning right after graduation at a Country Club and this is not far fetched. The “cook patrol” shirts had me absolutely rolling on the ground. This book was so much more than bridesmaids/bridal relationship, or any kind of love story. This was about finding yourself and trusting others to love you for who you are! Ugh, I loved it so much! The friendships (Cara + Sophie) were amazing and it really had me thankful for my personal friendships and all that I’ve dealt with in these past years.

As someone who has worked with event planning specializing in weddings, and loved the friendships of the close friends I do have, this book was amazing. It was cheeky, wonderful banter, and amazing friendship. Am I getting sappy? Probably. This is definitely one of my favorite books of the year. Also, Chivari chairs will always be the answer.

Thank you SMP for the gifted copy. The Secret Bridesmaid is out May 4th!

3 quirky cute whimsy stars to this fun rom com by Katy Birchall! A fresh and hilarious take on the intricate logistics, family dynamics and all the emotions that go into wedding planning. Sophie lives in London and is a professional bridesmaid- a role that combines wedding planner, friend, therapist and crisis manager. She successfully helps brides from all backgrounds execute their perfect wedding day. She has never met a bride or challenge too complicated for her...until she is hired for Lady Cordelia Swann's wedding. A reluctant bride and a society wedding for 400 people...all within a few months? Sophie finds herself feeling overwhelmed.

This book left me charmed and with a smile on my face. As a bride in the midst of wedding planning, I could definitely relate to Sophie's wedding planning mishaps. There were several times I laughed out loud. A quick, fun heartfelt story with a reminder that love triumphs over everything!

Thank you to St. Martin's Press and Netgalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I love the secret identity trope. The secrets and weddings went hand in hand. So inventive to have a bridesmaid for hire. Cute! Comical! Romantic!

I LOVED this book! It was a genuinely fun experience to read, and I felt better about life every time I put it down after reading it. I especially loved that the friendship romance (? we need a better word for the development and trajectory of a friendship!) between Sophie and Cordelia was front and center, and not the romantic relationship between Sophie and Tom (although I loved that, too). I've already recommended it to many of my friends!

If you are a big fan of weddings and wedding drama, then The Secret Bridesmaid may be the book for you!

This wasn’t the book for me personally but it is a fun and light read that romance and chick lit fans may really enjoy.

What I liked: The tone and voice of this book is fun and easy to read. I really loved Sophie’s friendship with Cara- they both have a ton of personality as well. The format is also unique, with a mix of Sophie’s hilarious business email situations and text chats mixed into the book.

The format is also part of what didn’t work for me though - a mixed media format sometimes can feel too abrupt to me, and in this case, it really took me out of the story at times. But some readers may love these bits! Otherwise, I felt like this was slow to pick up pacing-wise; I wanted a bit more action and romance earlier on to be more invested here.

Last, there was some language that always disappoints me to see in this day and age, including appropriation of indigenous culture (“spirit animal,” dream catchers as a wedding decor) and a character who makes an “I’m going to kill myself” joke, which is never ok to me. This detail may seem minor but both moments really took me out of the story.

I didn’t love this enough to keep reading past 30% given the above issues I had, but I do think many readers of this genre would enjoy this book! It’s just not the right one for me.

This was a pretty light hearted read and I enjoyed it for the most part. I did have a really hard time connecting to the characters and I don't know if it was the age or maybe just that I've never experienced anything like the MC does. I would recommend this to maybe an older audience (maybe 30s) just because the events in this book are definitely aimed at connecting to the experience of people in that demographic.

Sophie is a professional bridesmaid. She helps the bride plan the wedding and also steps in as a bridesmaid by pretending to have a friendship with the bride. Sophie gets a call from a mom inquiring about her services. Who is the lucky bride you wonder, the one and only Lady Cordelia Swann. Sophie is tickled over this so she can finally get some weddings of those who are in celebrity status. The only problem, Cordelia wants nothing to do with her.

The Secret Bridesmaid, by Katy Birchall, has all the trappings of a fun, funny romantic story -- but instead it is a little hard to believe, tough to swallow, and a little, sadly, boring.

Sophie Breeze is a professional bridesmaid, who makes her living pretending to be friends with brides all around London, in order to help them with all things wedding related, from keeping their new in-laws from fighting, to helping pick out flower arrangements, all the way to wearing a Chewbacca outfit to the ceremony (yes, that is an actual scene in this book). Sophie does all of this while keeping her status as a paid employee 100% confidential -- instead, she poses as a childhood friend, a distant family member, a new friend from work -- anything to keep the bride's friends, family, and often even groom, from knowing her true identity.

When Sophie is hired by the mother of Lady Cordelia, the bride is not happy about it -- and makes that displeasure clear to Sophie, doing everything she can to get Sophie to quit. Sophie is determined to hang on and see it through, however, not just because of her work ethic, or the connections that this wedding will provide her, but at least in part because of Cordelia's surprisingly hot brother.

Right off the bat, one has to accept the premise that hiring a wedding planner is somehow such a tremendous embarrassment, even in the year 2021, that folks would go so far as to lie to their closest loved ones about a friend so dear to them that they could potentially be a bridesmaid. This premise is based on reality (professional bridesmaids are a thing!) but it is a little hard to accept in the case of Cordelia and her family -- Cordelia famously has no friends, and yet here is one ready-made the moment she wants to get married. The premise, therefore, requires a little suspension of disbelief. As for Cordelia herself, she is so fundamentally terrible and cruel a person that even the inevitable explanation as to the trauma that causes such cruelness is, again, a little tough to swallow. Cordelia is, after all, a full grown adult who is hazing a paid employee -- not a character I found myself particularly wanting to root for.

Sophie's journey through the book is a little messy and poorly fleshed out -- she has been told by her recent ex-boyfriend (who is newly engaged) and Cordelia herself that she lacks spontaneity, that she works as a bridesmaid because she's too cowardly for the spotlight, and that she should be more "sassy" (what, exactly, is meant by sassy is unclear, but the word is used at least a dozen times throughout the novel). Sophie doesn't exactly go on a journey of self-discovery, nor does she really address these issues head on. Instead, she whines about it to her BFF/cousin, uses it as an excuse to continue with the job even while she's being hazed, and eventually ends up...nowhere much changed. Her entire internal path is vague and unclear, and for a book that is fundamentally about that, it doesn't bode well that even describing WHAT Sophie's issues are, exactly, is challenging for the reader.

The love interest is similarly poorly fleshed out -- he is hot, he is vaguely charming, and he lacks much personality. The relationship between Sophie and Cordelia is somewhat more compelling (although I found myself wanting to shake Sophie and tell her to get the heck out of that job), but the characters overall are a bit stale.

There are a few amusing moments sprinkled throughout, and it is not outwardly offensive (although the thorough lack of diversity is borderline), but overall it is a rather bland, boring take on what could have been a fun, funny story.

Thank you to St. Martin's Griffin and NetGalley for the ARC!

Sometimes I need to change things up from all the historical novels and the thrillers and read a fun, lighthearted romp like this one.

Sophie Breeze is A Secret Bridesmaid, meaning she is usually hired on by a bride or relative to assist in all the overwhelming tasks a bride needs to do before the big day but in the guise of a distant friend who has come to the rescue for some of these tasks. Sophie has proven invaluable to some of the brides she has assisted whether dressing up as a Star Wars character or to making sure orders for t-shirts with catchy phrases is correct, Sophie does it all. When a friend refers her to the elegant, upper crust Lady Meade who is in need of a secret bridesmaid for her daughter's upcoming nuptials, Sophie sees this a chance to further promote her fledgling operation and branch out. But, little does she know that Lady Meade's daughter Cordelia is a BRIDEZILLA in the worst way and Sophie really has her work cut out for her. Sometimes I felt so bad for Sophie, aka Emily as she comes to be known in the part of bridesmaid she plays to unsuspecting family and friends, she certainly was not a quitter and I rooted for her even when I would have thrown in the towel if it were me.
This was a charming, fun read that I could easily see being made into a movie with maybe the suave Tom Hiddleston or Henry Cavill as her dashingly, handsome brother, Tom (just my opinion).

Thanks to author Katy Birchall and NetGalley for a digital copy of this in exchange for my review.

Man, this was such a lovely read. It hit so many spots for me - two cute romances, an extremely, EXTREMELY cute friendship, adorable quirky family hijinks, and laugh-out-loud hilarious. I have to say, the epistolary bits between chapters were even funnier than the regular narration. Perhaps Katy Birchall should consider writing an epistolary novel next? Her style reminds me of both Sophie Kinsella and Meg Cabot, whom I adore. Apparently this is her first adult novel, and I really, really hope there are more!

The Secret Bridesmaid has a premise that to me requires some suspension of disbelief, because it's about a woman who makes a regular living as a hired bridesmaid, a job that also requires her to create fake identities for each client. I find it hard to believe that the market for these services would be adequate to generate a steady and/or comfortable income and don't fully understand the need for fake identities, but the plot and shenanigans all stem from these points. While this plot device may be a little flimsy, the novel's main strengths are the humor and characters. Sophie, the aforementioned and titular secret bridesmaid, finds herself bridesmaid-ing to It Girl and general misanthrope, Cordelia Swann. I absolutely love Cordelia. I love her good side and her bad side, I love her depth and her dialogue, I love her character arc, and her relationships with all the other characters, and the lenses through which they see her. Furthermore, I love that the book centers the relationship between Sophie and Cordelia. Readers looking for an emphasis on romance may be disappointed - there is romance (excellent romance in my opinion), but it definitely takes a back seat. Is there a word that is the equivalent to bromance but for women? Because that's what this is. Any reader looking for that will be in heaven. It's extremely readable and fun, goofy, and feel-good without being excessively saccharine.

Such a fun, happy read. I enjoyed every part of this book. The story, the writing, the characters; it was the kind of book you don’t want to end. If you need a book that is lighthearted and will give you a laugh, this is the one you should be picking up.
Thank you so much to Netgalley, St. Martian’s Press and Katy Birchall for the ARC of this book.

4,5 stars!
Sophie is a professional bridesmaid, not a wedding planner. Her job is to support the bride in every possible way. She is hired by a marchioness to be her daughter Cordelia's bridesmaid. They have a disastrous start and Cordelia tries her best to make Sophie quit the job.
Adorable, kind, delightful and funny story about friendship and love. Sophie is a lovely character and I would love to be her friend. Cordelia was awful at first, but I can't blame her for that. This book is not a thriller, but it might as well be. I was turning pages and losing sleep in order to find out what happens next. The writing style is mesmerizing and I did not want the story to end. Fingers crossed for a sequel.

The Secret Bridesmaid was a delightfully entertaining afternoon read! Sophie Breeze is a professional bridesmaid hired for a high society wedding in which the bride is a nightmare diva. This definitely gave me Miranda Priestly vibes crossed with The Wedding Planner circa 2001 (Sophie Breeze as a modern JLo?). It provided a steady stream of escalating drama, laugh out loud moments at the absurdity of the bride’s requests, a sweet side love story with the bride’s brother, and ultimately, a story of uplifting female friendships. I also thoroughly enjoyed the snippets of Sophie’s other wedding jobs interspersed throughout the book, which are maddeningly hilarious and a little too relatable if you’ve ever planned a wedding. If you're looking for a quick and charming read this is an excellent choice.

Thank you St Martin’s Press via NetGalley for an advance digital copy, I’m happy to provide an honest review!

This was my first time reading from Birchall and I couldn't wait to give The Secret Bridesmaid a try. I'm not a huge fan of women's fiction but still decided to give it a try for a book club read. And it wasn't too bad, it was a slow start for me, but as I kept going I was loving the development between Sophie/Emily and Cordelia's friendship.

In this case, it was a enemies to friends kind of friendship, took some time and Sophie never gave up ... even though Cordelia would make it tough for her sometimes. There were so many comical parts in this book that had me chuckling.

Being the romance lover that I am, I'll always wish for more of that in a book. They're subtle and it's more of a side story, with the relationship between Sophie and Cordelia taking center stage.

If you're looking for a light read that focuses on the character development between two women and their eventual friendship, this one is for you.

3.5/5

What a great book!

I wasn't expecting this story when I first picked this book up but I am so pleasantly surprised with how it turned out! The story was great and unique and it was very well executed. Plus the dialogue scenes were my favourite part, got me laughing every time!

I think the main character was fantastic. she stood her ground and knew her worth multiple times and it was nice to see how things took a turn for the better at the end, to leave the reader off feeling satisfied.

Thank you to NetGalley and St.Martin's Press for the earc in return for an honest review.

Sophie Breeze is a professional bridesmaid, which is different than a wedding planner. She acts as a friend with a fake name and background to help the bride with all the little details and encouragements.

The email exchanges and text conversations were so on point with how it feels talking to people/customer service most times. I admit I come back with "telephone" like responses to my husband as well. But when you get to the t-shirt email you will know what I mean. 

I actually kind of want to be a Secret Bridesmaid now. I went down a google rabbit hole and apparently there are people who do this as a service.

It seems super demanding and brides are not the best of customers. They want everything to be a perfect dream, why not it's their special day. I don't think that's the kind of bride that I was (no one told me otherwise). But weddings are a very unique day.

Sophie takes on a very demanding, very famous client who's mother hired her and the Bride wants absolutely nothing to do with her. She's part of the aristocracy as they are in London. But this young lady has some trust issues and therefore starts making outrageous demands of Sophie just to get her to quit or be fired. I laughed a lot some of the antics where hilarious or cruel. And one of the Lady's former friends was a vindictive horrid person not to mention Sophie's ex fiancee, ugh what a prick.

Sophie also gets a little close to this Lady's brother despite trying to be professional and it's so adorable. You get all the little butterflies.

I just love how Sophie (Emily) and Lady Cordelia's relationship evolved. It was a definite rough start but her heartfelt touches to the wedding and perseverance to not give up won out.

This cover is so beautiful too! I just love her whole outfit! 

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐💫

Thank you Net Galley and stmartinspress for the e-ARC for my honest and voluntary review.