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 enlarge | Author: Elizabeth Gilbert
Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics)
Category: Book
List Price: $15.00
Buy Used: $4.39
You Save: $10.61 (71%)
New (142) Collectible (6) from $5.25
Avg. Customer Rating:  1562 reviews
Sales Rank: 21
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 352
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 8.3 x 5.4 x 0.8
ISBN: 0143038419
Dewey Decimal Number: 910.4
EAN: 9780143038412
ASIN: 0143038419
Publication Date: January 30, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: clean pages minimal wear on cover
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| Customer Reviews:
 Eat, Pray Love: Self-Indulgent, Shallow, Unfulfilling July 16, 2008
4 out of 5 found this review helpful
I was excited to find this book, having recently rediscovered my passion for travel. The book came to me highly recommended and the description on the back made me even more sure I had found a winner. I could not have been more disappointed. Gilbert, while a gifted writer possessing at times likeable voice, tries too hard too often to be liked. Some pages are genuinely funny while others come across as forced where it is obvious she is fishing for a laugh. This book comes across to me as very shallow and trite. I respect her not wanting to trash her husband, but to not give any details about the devorce? Fishy, very fishy. In the middle of huge pity-party, Gilbert decides to drop everything, and, with a huge sum of forwarded money from the deal that would later come of this book, spend a year of her life "rediscovering herself." What follows is just hogwash! Always vague, never truly saying anything, Gilbert throws up a fog over her journey that a reader has to squint to see through to see what is really going on inside her. Finally, this woman spends half a year in India and Indonesia and no mention of the appauling poverty she must have seen everyday around her. Surely this had to affect her; I hope it left a bigger impression on her than an ex-junkie redneck from Texas.
All this said, the book was funny at parts and I enjoyed her colorful descriptions of some of the characters she met along the way. This could have been a great book, but in the end it comes across as a big woe-is-me tale.
 A quirky, authentic, and candid memoir July 14, 2008
4 out of 6 found this review helpful
Elizabeth Gilbert is a funny, authentic, quirky, liberal, and openminded person. Very expressive and creative in her writing. She didn't pretend to be anything other than what she was. She spoke about very personal things and what really happened to her on her journey.
Some other reviewers seemed to think her insights were shallow and self-absorbed. It was a memoir - was she supposed to focus on others? As a woman - I heard myself in things she shared and not so much in others, but I appreciated her honestly expressing what she went through-regardless of whether I would have done the same or not. It's not easy to open up with so many judgements out there on how we "should" be - especially for women. I've had friends who have been through divorce, depression - and they all related a lot to those parts and how much pressure we have to be "selfless" and just fit the mold.
As for her insights in the Ashram - I've been to meditation treats - intense ones, and it was like that for me as well. I found her very amusing in her recount of it - and resonated with the challenges and the insights she had there. I'm not sure if I would have got it before I went. All in all - a thoroughly enjoyable & amusing book.
Self Indulgent Story July 14, 2008
1 out of 5 found this review helpful
I wish everyone had the chance to "find" themselves. I was OK with the Italian part, but lost her in the Ashram. She was fortunate to be able to spend a year jaunting around the world. Did she see the poverty in India? Her final awareness of God and the universe was accurate, but she wrote too much about it. She is an entertaining writer, though, and she was reinventing herself after a failed relationship. It was a relaxing, enjoyable read, but very few of us will ever have the luxury of this kind of year.
Lighten Up, People! July 13, 2008
3 out of 5 found this review helpful
Yes, it's a classic Oprah female self discovery book. Yes, there is more than the leopard's share (not really a lion's share, somewhat less than that)of navel gazing. But no, Liz Gilbert is not the shallow, selfish bimbo that negative reviewers make her out to be. She's not narcissistic. She's brutally honest about herself.
Would I buy a book like this normally? No - glad I picked it up in a remainder table at B&N, because I would have been annoyed at the flurry of similar books amazon would have started suggesting if I'd bought it OL. Do I feel like I wasted my time reading it? No! It was fun, rather touching, one woman's soul searching journey. Yeah, the India part was meditation 101, but it still served it's purpose by showing her movement forward.
The last part of the book about Bali is the best. She showed tremendous growth, IMO, and I'm glad she profited by it on many levels. The pettier flames on amazon are most definitely the product of jealous, resentful, childish resentment. It's kind of scary that people can burble over male self discovery ruminations but get so threatened by a very feminine viewpoint of these things. No small part of that is the need for the Witch to Burn (tm) for not being a pristeen character. Wonder how long it will take for that syndrome to shake out of our culture(s)? THAT'S the most appealing thing about this book to me, the very strong sense of balance between negative and positive in human nature.
Likable and Interesting July 12, 2008
3 out of 6 found this review helpful
I am kind of confused by the reviews I have been reading here on Amazon. The book delivered exactly what it said it would deliver. The subtitle alone is "One Woman's Search for Everything...." It's not every woman's/person's search. Maybe you all don't find that you can relate to her journey because its very self-absorbed? Its a memoir. How can it not be?
I appreciated reading about her unique journey and attempt to heal herself of her very personal struggles/pain. I can even relate to some of them. Not all of them. And yes, India was kind of tough to get through at times. Maybe because I am not super interested in the type of meditation she practiced or really, meditation in general. But, I still enjoyed reading it and learning something new.
To blame her for being self-indulgent seems redundant because I don't think she would really argue with you. If anything, that was her intention.
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