Tuesday, January 5, 2010

Interview: Elizabeth Gilbert

From the Houston Chronicle:
The success of Elizabeth Gilbert's last book, Eat, Pray, Love, was stupendous.

A memoir of her solitary trip through Italy, India and Indonesia, Eat, Pray, Love struck a chord with women that still resonates. By the end of the book, Gilbert had shed the ghost of her first marriage and fallen hard for Felipe, an older, Brazilian man. Reading along, millions of women cheered.

Those same readers are expected to flock to see the upcoming film with Julia Roberts and Javier Bardem in leading roles.

Today marks the release of Gilbert's second memoir, Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace With Marriage. The book does double duty. It looks at the history of Western marriage and picks up a few years after Eat, Pray, Love ends.

Gilbert and Felipe have been living in Philadelphia. But after a business trip overseas, Felipe, an Australian citizen, is denied re-entry to the United States at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport. The easiest way for him to remain is to marry Gilbert. But he needs a fiancé visa and, until he gets it, he cannot return.

Sentenced to wed, Gilbert travels with Felipe for 10 months and researches the institution she vowed never to enter into again.

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