Have you read Elizabeth Gilbert’s new book All the Way to the River? She markets it as her most vulnerable book yet – and yes I’d 100% agree. She shows the reader her soft parts and her nasty parts. I was cringing at her actions in some moments and in awe of her in others.
This book is a memoir about her relationship with her wife Rayya. If you’ve read Gilbert’s first memoir Eat, Pray, Love – this new book, All the Way to the River, is a compelling sequel.
Today, I’m giving you my synopsis of it to give you hopefully enough information to see if it’s a book you’d want to read. My next post will be about dealing with other people’s judgments. Her new book has had very mixed reviews and I think we can learn something from how she has handled it.
Eat, Pray, Love
Elizabeth Gilbert’s first memoir is written like a rom-com, starting with eating miles of delicious food in Italy after the end of her marriage, then going to India to receive spiritual support as she grieves and moves forward in life, and then ends with love in Bali (and a relationship with a man she loves and marries). It was also made into a movie starring Julia Roberts.
Love, Eat, Pray (AKA All the Way to the River)
Elizabeth Gilbert was in her thirties when she wrote her first memoir and now she is in her fifties. That in itself makes All The Way to the River an intriguing read – I think we all know that our memoir would look differently in our thirties than in our fifties. Instead of ending in love this time, she ends in prayer.
Love
Liz Gilbert shares her love story of connecting to Rayya – as her hairdresser in 2000, then her best-friend over the years and finally her wife.
Eat
Rayya is diagnosed with a late-stage cancer. Gilbert and Rayya decide to live life to the fullest with sex, drugs, spending money & partying during the little time they might have together. They have incredible highs and incredible lows.
The Goodreads synopsis writes: “What if the love of your life—and the person you most trusted in the world—became a danger to your sanity and well-being? What if the dear friend who taught you so much about your self-destructive tendencies became the unstable partner with whom you disastrously reenacted every one of them? And what if your most devastating heartbreak opened a pathway to your greatest awakening?”
Pray
After Rayya’s death, Gilbert grieves and starts to do some of her inner work – joining a 12 step program and deciding to be single for an extended period of time. She shares her journey back to herself and doesn’t leave the reader with the idea that “voila, she’s healed”. She talks about her ongoing struggles but that her spiritual path is what anchors her through the tough spots in life.
Throughout the book she shares poetry and some of the writings to herself from her most Loving Part. Liz Gilbert started a community on Substack called Letters from Love. Every week she has a person (sometimes a celebrity) share their letter written from their loving part.
What if you started each day writing to yourself from your most loving part?
Some book-club type questions:
What anchors you through the trials in your life?
What was your reaction to Liz Gilbert showing her soft parts?
What was your reaction to Liz Gilbert showing her messy parts?
If you’ve read this book – let me know your thoughts!
