Book #5: Eat, Pray, Love

Happy Friday!!  So glad it is the weekend!!

 I'm sure that most of you have seen Eat, Pray, Love at the theater or on DVD at this point, but I never did.  When I saw the previews before it was released, I thought it looked interesting, but I never made a point to go see it.  I am SO glad that I read the book before I saw the movie though.  After finishing the book, I watched the movie to see how it compared and I didn't like the movie very much at all!!  So much of her personal journey was left out of the movie...only to be replaced with romance....which was never her objective or goal in the book.  It was very disappointing.

Anyway, back to the book...it was great!  I really enjoyed going on an personal journey with the author.  It was a very honest and insightful account of a really rough time in her life.  It sounds like a lot of fun and very exciting to spend a year traveling and exploring various parts of the world - namely Italy, India, and Indonesia - but it was a true time of growth and learning for her.  I really admired her ability to go on this search.  Realistically most people would never be able to afford to have this type of luxurious ability to leave everything behind and travel for a year, but she was able to do so and I think that is great.  I felt particularly drawn to her questioning of herself and why at age 30 she didn't feel ready to have children in the beginning of the book.  It is true that society puts a lot of pressure on people to be married by a certain age and have children by another certain age and if you don't fit that mold then something is wrong with you or you are selfish.  I can identify with her in some ways and I know many of my friends who feel similarly trapped and anxious because of that pressure.  It was very interesting to see how she dealt with it and how it affected her marriage in the beginning of the book.  Once she started her adventure, things were much more upbeat and pleasant, but she did continue to deal with a lot of internal turmoil.  She also met a lot of really fabulous people.  I think that is one thing I've learned from my travels, too.  People everywhere are all the same.  They (generally) want to help and want you to enjoy their part of the world.  That's one of the best parts about traveling.  Getting in there with the locals and really experiencing everything.

Overall, I would highly recommend this book...particularly to women.  It was a very easy read and definitely made me start to itch for a vacation of my own.  

Have you read the book or seen the movie?  What did you think?

Andrea :)