A year or so ago, I had a chance to interview Elizabeth Gilbert—the lovely, charming, personable writer behind Eat, Pray Love—when she was in town for a reading at our venerable, Buddhist-owned Boulder Bookstore. At the last second, we got a call from her rep that she was sick, and had to conserve her voice for the reading. A great loss to elephant readers, sure—but given that there’s only three or four decent videos on all of Youtube on Ms. Gilbert, our loss is also a loss to Gilbert fans, everywhere (if I don’t say so myself…).

A New York Times bestseller (thanks in part to the God that is Oprah), Eat, Pray, Love is the story that follows Gilbert’s divorce, in her early 30s—and the subsequent search for real pleasure (in Italy, of course) and real devotion (in India, of course) and both at the same time (in Bali).  

“Gilbert’s prose is fueled by a mix of intelligence, wit and colloquial exuberance that is close to irresistible, and makes the reader only too glad to join the posse of friends and devotees who have the pleasure of listening in.” ~ Jennifer Egan, NY Times, Feb 2006