If you’re trying to plan a unique event without the help of an in-person wedding planner, Signature Weddings: Creating a Day Uniquely Your Own by event planner Michelle Rago can help. The book takes readers through her design process and provides 10 examples of how her plans came together. The same process can be adapted by brides on a budget to come up with the signature elements of their own wedding design.

The cornerstone of Rago’s planning process is brainstorming, which leads her to the colors and elements (design features) of a particular wedding. However, the description of her design process is lengthy and follows a few too many sidetracks. Most people will not be interested in the author’s favorite movies, for example. She also has a faith in inspiration that people who don’t consider themselves creative might find a little over the top.

Whether you agree with her philosophy or not, the book is a solid starting point for those who don’t know how to plan a wedding that isn’t cookie-cutter. It allows readers to see the inspiration behind the final design and how it was carried out, which can be incredibly useful in planning an event from scratch.

For a wedding book that is all fantasy and little reality for most brides, there’s Colin Cowie’s Extraordinary Weddings: From a Glimmer of an Idea to a Legendary Event. This lavish book highlights 14 weddings planned and executed by the superstar wedding planner. These are certainly not your typical ceremonies. Highlights are destination weddings in Italy and the Bahamas and the only private party ever given on the stage of the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City.

Still, the book and the weddings are beautiful and offer some advice for celebrations that don’t involve a DJ flown in from Paris. Cowie reminds readers that weddings aren’t about impressing guests, they are intended to bring a new family together in love. That’s true whether you’re inviting five guests or 500.

The Engaged Groom (subtitled You’re Getting Married Read This Book ) is more intent on quelling that rising gorge in your throat with savvy advice on subjects ranging from picking a date to surviving a bachelor party, and even has a handy diagram showing the proper bow-tying technique.

The best thing I can say is that I’m glad I don’t have to go through it again (though I wouldn’t trade the experience, or my wife, for anything). I can now enjoy these books, then pass them on to my recently engaged son. That might be a good idea for you, too, if you’ve got a male relative or friend preparing for the big step.

For a no-nonsense guide to wedding planning, Countdown to Your Perfect Wedding: From Engagement to Honeymoon, A Week-by-Week Guide to Planning the Happiest Day of Your Life can’t be beat. This thoroughly inclusive guide sets out the steps to plan your dream wedding in a year or less. Written by Joyce Scardina Becker, certified wedding consultant and contributing editor to theKnot.com, Countdown provides a logical framework for someone who likes a structured timeline for everything, and will certainly set Type-A couples down the path to wedding-planning bliss. Sarah E. White is a freelance writer in Arkansas.

One of the first things many women do when they get engaged is pick up wedding magazines. InStyle Weddings takes articles and wedding stories from the magazine of the same name. This richly illustrated tome will help those visual people who want to see the difference between an A-line and an Empire dress before they go shopping or to consider the virtues of a chignon instead of a ponytail in the comfort of their home. This book offers basic checklists such as the duties of the wedding party and a six-month health regimen. However, InStyle Weddings is more about showing the options than giving advice, including stories from celebrity weddings such as Rob Thomas and Marisol Maldonado’s California ranch wedding and Toni Braxton and Keri Lewis’ Tiffany-inspired soiree. It’s not the most sensible wedding book on the planet, but, hey, a girl can dream.

Sarah E. White is a freelance writer in Arkansas.

For brides who want to dream big (with a budget to match), this book from Vogue’s favorite wedding coordinator offers many beautiful, modern and stylish ideas. Jo Gartin’s Weddings: An Inspiring Guide for the Stylish Bride is basically a portfolio of the author’s favorite work for her clients, famous and not. It offers lavish ideas for invitations, dresses, flowers, ceremony dŽcor, welcome gifts, party favors, seating arrangement displays, tiny desserts and towering cakes and rarely does Gartin suggest that any of the above isn’t necessary. There are a few tips for the budget-conscious (and sewing-savvy) bride as Gartin illustrates dress and shoe makeovers to convert an off-the-rack find to a one-of-a-kind creation, though one wonders how many brides-to-be would be willing to take a pair of scissors to their precious dresses. Sarah E. White is a freelance writer in Arkansas.

For brides who want something unique for their floral design, To Have and to Hold: Magical Wedding Bouquets is an indispensable guide to flowers. This lush book illustrates a wide variety of floral options, arranged by when the flowers are in season for greater economy.

The book is incredibly New York City-centric because that’s where authors David Stark and Avi Adler are sought-after event planners. A price guide is offered based on the going rate for blooms in the city, but no suggestions are given for how brides who don’t live in big cities might have beautiful flowers without spending a fortune. Still, To Have and to Hold offers valuable tips on selecting flowers (and thinking beyond just flowers) and arranging them for different looks. Some how-tos are included, so a crafty bride could recreate some of these looks herself, and the novel ideas for wrapping flowers will spark readers’ imaginations.

Sarah E. White is a freelance writer in Arkansas.

How-to books read by folks who already know how-to can’t help but elicit rueful chuckles; imagine how a mechanic feels reading Car Repair for Dummies. Speaking as someone who’s been married twice, once three decades ago, once last year (and who was ignorant both times), I found Peter Scott’s Well Groomed to be full of laughs, some intentional, some not. Well Groomed subtitled A Wedding Planner for What’s-His-Name (And His Bride) is deliberately tongue-in-cheek humorous. When Scott draws comparisons between Bride Magazin and Penthouse, the married groom (known as the husband), laughs and shakes his head, because he knows the truth behind the laughs. Scott also brings his wry insight to bear on such exotic subjects (to the male, anyway) as The Guest List, The Reception Menu and That Pesky Wedding Day Nausea.

Many new books on wedding planning take this go-your-own-way approach, not only telling couples it’s fine to do what they want, but also attempting to show them how to achieve it. Diane Meier Delaney’s The New American Wedding is a 256-page pep talk on just this subject. It convinces would-be brides and grooms that it’s perfectly acceptable to have what some would term a nontraditional wedding and shows that more couples are choosing to do their own thing. From alternative engagements (and jewelry) to different-from-normal vows, ceremony locations, attendants, showers and more, couples are finding that putting their own marks on their special day makes the ceremony and experience of their wedding much more personal and real. Delaney offers inspiration, stories and examples from her own experience and from other couples who have crafted their own ceremonies and had beautiful, heartfelt weddings as a result. Though the book sometimes reads like an ad for the author’s favorite vendors (many of whom she works with in her day job as a marketer), it is helpful to couples who want to do something different but have no idea what their options are.

Sarah E. White is a freelance writer in Arkansas.