Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert

What I heard prior to reading: woman leaves husband, plays the victim, somehow gets prepaid trip to: around the world, and whines and dines in Italy until she gets her act together.  And yes, I meant "whines and dines", because it's supposedly written like a New York Times Bestseller Sob Story.

However, I gave this book a try because:
1. I swapped books with a friend while I was in India and heard that the book had something to do with India, so this seemed like a good novel to read while in India and traveling.
2. The friend who swapped books with me is incredibly kind and I didn't want to let her down!

Right from the beginning, it was clear that Liz is crazy-needy... she leaves her husband because she's not happy and jumps straight into the arms of her lover, David.  Her justification for everything was basically "well, it's been hard for me too.  Here's a chapter about me suffering.  Just so you know that everything is kinda "fair" and I don't deserve to be hated."  She plays the victim role pretty well, going on and on about her sleepless nights (yeah-no I wouldn't be able to sleep if I screwed over my husband either).  I felt terrible while reading this book because I felt incredibly judgmental and did not want to go down that path of hating the 'protagonist' in the books I read.  But I carried on because I was promised vicarious living through the eating of Italian food and exploring the wonders of India and Indonesia.

I did like the layout of the books into segments, which made it easy to set it down and resume with another tale without backtracking.  Her metaphors are a tad ridiculous (David was catnip and kryptonite to me), but her descriptions about the food in Italy made my mouth water (that pizza in Naples), and I admired that she could easily befriend the most random people (beefy and hairy Richard from Texas, now in an Indian ashram) in her travels.  I also liked that she would sidestep into really interesting historical facts to give the reader context on why a particular moment/place was such a big deal to her.

Lastly, I concede that she did write some sentences that I loved.  There was this section where she bared her vulnerabilities in the ashram, exhaustedly surrendered her skepticism and confessed:  I want God to play in my bloodstream the way sunlight amuses itself on water.

I wished that she had ended it there, because I didn't love the "love" part of the book, where she was in Indonesia and finds herself (by finding herself another man).  Really? After all that time of struggling through depression, self-doubt, and experiencing religious renewal, you come away from this trip with "validation" from yet another fling?  Come on, Liz, I thought you were (getting) better than that!

I've been to Israel and India.  Did the praying part in Israel and the eating part in India.  Maybe I'll go find myself a lover from Ireland or Iceland.  Book deal or bust, my friends!!