Elizabeth Gilbert - Eat, Pray, Love

This was another case of me watching a film and then wanting to read the book because I was intrigued; Eat Pray Love with Julia Roberts as Elizabeth is one of my favourite films because it makes me laugh and cry.  As I said, the film intrigued me so I decided to buy the book to see what it was like because I knew it was a non-fiction novel, specifically an autobiographical novel, and these can be hard to adapt as they are based on someone's life so inaccuracies can be found to be even more upsetting for certain people, including the subject of the original text.

Eat, Pray, Love or the full title, Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia is a memoir from Elizabeth Gilbert, an American author, which chronicles her journey around the world following her messy divorce.  Eat, Pray, Love is her fourth book but was the first one of hers I picked up; it was a very personal book and was an interesting read.

Rating: 8

Recommended To: Anyone going through a rough time; anyone

Favourite Part: Giulio and Maria have a beautiful apartment, the most impressive feature of which is, to my mind, the wall that Maria once covered with angry curses against Giulio (scrawled in thick black magic marker) because they were having an argument and "he yells louder than me" and she wanted to get a word in edgewise. - Page 60 

Good Points: Loved the Italy/Eat section; a lot emotion written; great premise

Bad Points: Found Pray tedious; some unnecessary anecdotes; couldn't always connect with the book

Eat, Pray, Love follows Gilbert as she goes to Italy, India, and Indonesia for a year of "spiritual and personal exploration" as she called it to her publisher who financed the trip.  Gilbert is 32 years old at the beginning of the book, well educated, owns a home, has a husband, and is a successful writer but she feels unfulfilled in her life and her marriage so she asks her husband for a divorce which becomes a difficult part of her life.  She embarks on a rebound relationship with a younger man who is starring in a play she wrote as she is getting divorce which she throws herself into; it starts off fine but as she gets deeper in, she realises that the relationship isn't right and struggles to separate from this young man, leaving her devastated and alone again.  After everything she has been through and her very difficult divorce finalised, she decides to take a year long trip travelling the world, or three particular countries: Italy, India, and Indonesia.  The plan is to discover herself once again after losing herself in every relationship she has ever been in.

Italy AKA Eat was by far my favourite section in the book because I found it to be the most interesting part as she is still reeling from what has happened to her in the States.  I found this section to be the most honest as Gilbert is raw and is therefore upfront about everything as she slowly grieves and heals.  She interacts with more people in this section, or she documents more of her interactions, as she becomes involved in the Italian culture and learns about it first-hand.  For me, if Gilbert had just written an entire book about her experiences in Italy and I would have loved it.

Gilbert made it clear how she was feeling in every moment of this book as she explained what was going on in her head and why she felt that way; while self-involved, it made it easier to understand why she was travelling in the first place.  Due to the clarity of her reasoning, I can tell she is a good writer as she wants to engage the reader as much as possible and tell her very personal tale; because of this, I have found another book of hers at work and bought it immediately.

The premise and concept behind this book, interested me in the first place as the three countries are very different and could be a culture shock for many; I liked how she set out to have three different experiences as it was clear and easy to understand that this is what she wanted: to indulge herself in Italy, to understand herself better in India, and to build herself up again in Indonesia.  This has actually inspired me to travel and while I have no plans yet, I do hope to have some soon in the future.

While I enjoyed this book and the concept of it as well, I found the Pray section to be a little tedious because it was just full of ponderings on the concept of God and didn't particularly fit with the other two sections as they focussed on the people Liz interacted with.  There were some parts of Pray I enjoyed where she interacted with the others at the temple but there weren't that many so I wasn't able to enjoy this particularly as much.  Personally, I thought this section could be skipped over very easily as it has no benefit to the story really but must have been important to Gilbert; like I said, I could have skipped this as I think the middle of a book should be as strong as its beginning and its end.

As I've said there were a number of ponderings and personal musings in the Pray section as well as Eat and Love which I found to be unnecessary anecdotes which didn't add to the story and made the book drag in places.  It was as if Gilbert was just trying to fill pages.  I can understand why other reviewers call this book a self-absorbed piece of work which they didn't find appealing but it's a memoir and is supposed to be a self-indulgent book as she was working out who she was and how she was feeling after a hard divorce and the following intense relationship.

Due to my age and experiences in life, I have had different experiences to Gilbert and have never been divorced, forced to play a role I didn't want to play, or found myself lost in a relationship.  This meant I wasn't always able to connect with the book.  It's not the fault of Gilbert because Eat, Pray, Love is her own memoir, documenting her own experiences.  While it was interesting to read about it, I didn't fully understand what she was going on about; maybe if I come back to this book when I'm older and have had more life experience, I can understand Gilbert better.

Giulio and Maria have a beautiful apartment, the most impressive feature of which is, to my mind, the wall that Maria once covered with angry curses against Giulio (scrawled in thick black magic marker) because they were having an argument and "he yells louder than me" and she wanted to get a word in edgewise. - Page 60

I loved how these two people have immortalised an argument they've had by leaving this wall covered in curse-words in their apartment; I just found it fascinating that this man drove a woman to express herself in this way and they decided to keep it.  It shows this level of passion as well that while terrifying in a way, it can also be seen as wonderful for me at least as I would love to have someone in my life that drove me to writing on a wall because they've driven me mad for a few moments and then able to laugh at it with me afterwards.

While I enjoyed this book thoroughly, I don't agree with the Sunday Times when they implied that Eat, Pray, Love has become a bible for women wanting to initiate a change in their lives; this is a very self-indulgent memoir about Gilbert's trip to three different countries and documents her emotional, spiritual, and physical journey and I would only recommend it if you want to read about someone's life, it is not a self-help guide at all.  The Italy/Eat section was my favourite because of the interactions between Gilbert and the others she meets were wonderful, there was a lot of emotion written into the entire book, and the premise and concept were great as well.  I could have easily skipped over the Pray section because I found it tedious and made the book drag; as well as the Pray section, there were personal anecdotes that made the book drag too in parts but this is just a personal preference because she was musing on God and such which is not my cup of tea unfortunately.  As I've said before, I couldn't always connect with this book because of my situation in life but I would still recommend it to anyone who wants to read about someone going through a rough moment in their life as Gilbert was a wonderful writer and made me understand how she was feeling constantly.