"The ebullience comes back, two days before the wedding. The boomerang effect. Something else no one tells you about.

"They should parachute this information into the major cities".

For every woman who has ever dreamed of getting married or survived the pre-wedding hell of planning the big day; for every man who has ever watched in horror as the woman he loves mutates into a bride-to-be -- a wickedly funny first novel about the excruciating ritual otherwise known as modern marriage.

Michael has finally asked Eve to marry him. It is tempting to believe that everything is going according to plan. But from her first anxiety-producing encounter with Modern Bride magazine to setting a date ("My impression is that if you don't set a date, they stone you"), finding a dress, ordering invitations ("I don't want the plain envelopes. I want the white go-go boots. Everyone else has them"), and the unrelenting chaos of life in the world beyond the wedding, from the fights and resentment ("For eighteen months I rubbed his back and made him soup and performed really sincere fellatio and now I'm tired") to the disconcerting realization that lately when she looks at her fiance she hears the striking of a Chinese gong and the words FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFEechoing through her head, Eve discovers that planning a wedding is fraught with unexpected perils, and it's long walk to the altar.

Otherwise Engaged is a wry, deliciously caustic ride through the outsized rituals of an American wedding, and a hilarious portrait of what happens to an otherwise rational, intelligent woman when she begins to plan one.