Committed: A Love Story by Elizabeth Gilbert.......

This is the follow-up book to Eat, Pray, Love, and it was just as refreshing as the first book. After a painful divorce, Liz never wanted to marry again, even after she met Felipe, the love of her life. Like Liz, Felipe had survived a painful divorce and swore never to marry again, but the U.S. Government had other ideas.

In typical fashion, Gilbert set out to learn everything she could about the institution of marriage, not to learn ABOUT MARRIAGE, but to learn why she felt the way she did about marriage. Just like the first book, this non-fiction account reads very much like a novel, and it was compelling reading, even knowing from the beginning that they would live happily ever after. (That's not my spoiler - she tells us that at the beginning of the book.)

I love Gilbert's writing style. It's fresh, it's witty, it's honest, and it's sometimes self-deprecating. (Aside: Is it possible to be OTHER-deprecating? Just curious.) There are times when she ventures off into a detailed analysis of something she clearly cares a lot more about than I do, but it is worth plowing through those sections to enjoy the strawberry shortcake of the rest of the book. I have no idea why I just used that particular metaphor, because I don't even LIKE strawberry shortcake. It was a pretty stupid thing to say anyway, but in the interest of full disclosure of my idiocy, I'm leaving it in there instead of employing the delete key.

I am very envious of the way Gilbert strings words together. I KNOW all those words, and I know what MOST of them mean, yet I cannot seem to string them together the way she does. See what I mean? I just used the phrase "string [words] together" twice in the same paragraph, and I'm sure that's an explicitly stated no-no in the writer's handbook.

Another indication of my idiocy: At the end of a book, I'm not satisfied just reading the "The End" part. I actually read the author's acknowledgements at the end, fully aware that I won't know a soul she mentions. My name is never there. In reading the acknowledgements at the end of Committed, I discovered that Liz Gilbert and I have something else in common. Something in addition to our wittiness, our clever writing, and our thoughtful analyses of our lives. Yeah, right.

Liz professes a tendency to overuse the word "actually."

I think we're sisters or something.

Eat, Pray, Love by Liz Gilbert.......

Because I typically "discover" a bestselling book three or four years after everyone else has "discovered" it, I am not going to write a real review of this book. It has been reviewed to death, and I don't think I can offer anything more intelligent or insightful than anyone else has already said.

That being said, I did enjoy this book very much. I had resisted reading it initially because it had the word "pray" in it. I was afraid I would be struck by lightning if I attempted to read anything touching on religion or spirituality.

I absolutely love Liz Gilbert's writing style. She has just a touch of sarcasm (like me.... just a touch, right?), she employs exaggeration with aplomb (probably the first time I've used THAT word in my blog), and she isn't afraid to make fun of herself.

Anytime I read a new book that I like very much, I want to become that writer. I want to model my writing after her (or him, sometimes), and I find myself THINKING in that writer's style. I want to go wherever the book is set, I want to learn everything about the writer, I want to meet the same people that writer met.

This was particularly true of Eat, Pray, Love, probably because it is after all a true story. These aren't made-up characters; they are real. VERY real.

I was already interested in learning some of the Italian language (it's on my 50 Things to Do List, after all), but after reading this book I'm even more intrigued. I wish I had known more of the language in 1993 when I got trapped twice, first in a bathroom in Florence, and then on a train. Rome was one city we didn't have time (or resources) to get to, and I have always wanted to go back to Italy and include this magnificent city this time. (Shut up, Sweet Girl. I don't want to hear about your time there. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha)

I am even fascinated by Bali, not a place I would have put on my vacation wish-list before reading this book. It sounds like a marvelous place to visit, perhaps not so touristy as some other destinations. I am in awe of Liz Gilbert's talent for plopping herself down in a foreign country and not only surviving, but thriving.

The only part of the book I would have to pass on is the four months in India, living in an ashram and meditating for hours and hours every day. Scrubbing the floors at 4:00 AM wouldn't appeal to me either, but I would pick that over forced meditation and prayer any day. I'm just sayin'......

I want to be Liz Gilbert when I grow up.