I am very skeptical of a second memoir. Julie of Julie & Julia went on and wrote one about cheating on her husband and learning to be a butcher – two things that squiff me out oh so very much. I’m curious what Gilbert will do next, whether she’ll return to novel-writing or what.

I love your romantic comedy description — you’re absolutely right!

It’s good, eh? She writes a good travel book! Made me very much want to reread Eat Pray Love.

Even though I am not finished I can see what you mean about her talking to people. I wish the entire book was just one giant conversation because she is so real when she writes them.

Great review.

Thanks for your review, by the way – I’d been very unsure about reading it before I saw that!

I loved it when she described the Laotian (I think?) guy Keo – she’s great at capturing people’s voices. I liked it when he asked her to guess how many toenails an elephant had and then said “You are false. I will permit you to guess again.” That cracked me up. So yeah, I’m all in favor of more traveling and more repeating of conversations with people she met.

I agree with what you say about marriage in your own family shaping how you look at things. My parents didn’t get married until their late twenties, and when I was with my first boyfriend, it never seriously occurred to me that we’d “end up together”. Whereas one of my friends in high school, her parents dated in high school and got married as soon as they graduated, so when she was with her high school boyfriend, she was convinced he was her future husband. It’s interesting!

Stevens FTW! He is clever! And has a bow tie!

What’s holding you back from reading Eat Pray Love? Just all the hype, or you don’t like the sound of the premise?

Oh Lord, if I ever get pregnant, I’m going to be a mess. I’ll be spending all my time huddled inside a nest of books about babies and pregnancy and parenting and child development and child health. 😛

I actually wasn’t planning on reading it myself, but then I saw a good review of it on my blogroll, and then my mum bought it and said it was worth a read. I don’t think I would buy it – at least not at full price – because I don’t know that I’ll need to reread it. But I’m glad I read it the once.

I seriously had no idea there was going to be a movie. Not sure how that’s going to work out. The book is terrific though – I hope you like it!