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3.75 AVERAGE
3.75 AVERAGE
adventurous
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
lighthearted
relaxing
medium-paced
"As an observer, I am particularly interested in watching women, married, divorced, single. So many of them are trapped in lives they think they must live, in roles they have come to resent, with little joy and no laughter. They’ve “settled.” They’ve compromised. They’ve learned to adjust."
Being that I consider Rita to be a kindred spirit, I thought for sure this book would sit at the top of my stack of all-time favorites. Although the details are different, we have walked a very similar path. During my marriage, travel was my oxygen…during it's ending and after my divorce, it fostered my authenticity. But, I, like many other reviewers, found much of the book to be somewhere on the spectrum between mildly irritating to downright annoying.
Why? Well, if I’m being totally honest, the writing is just not that great. At this point in my reading life, I'm pretty intolerant of anything less than excellent writing.
There were several standout issues for me:
1) The book felt more like an overly detailed, yet simplistic, travel diary. I'm not interested in reading a list of names of who came to dinner or stopped by for a visit. Give me substance please!
2) I was frustrated by Rita’s lack of tenderness and raw emotion. I’ve been through the same metamorphosis as her…it’s a brutal transition where you often resort to the fetal position. Rawness between women should be shared so we feel a kinship!
3) There was an mild arrogance to Rita that I found mildly distasteful.
In all fairness, writing the kind of book that would have deeply resonated with me would have been a brutal, soul wrenching experience and much easier said than done.
Being that I consider Rita to be a kindred spirit, I thought for sure this book would sit at the top of my stack of all-time favorites. Although the details are different, we have walked a very similar path. During my marriage, travel was my oxygen…during it's ending and after my divorce, it fostered my authenticity. But, I, like many other reviewers, found much of the book to be somewhere on the spectrum between mildly irritating to downright annoying.
Why? Well, if I’m being totally honest, the writing is just not that great. At this point in my reading life, I'm pretty intolerant of anything less than excellent writing.
There were several standout issues for me:
1) The book felt more like an overly detailed, yet simplistic, travel diary. I'm not interested in reading a list of names of who came to dinner or stopped by for a visit. Give me substance please!
2) I was frustrated by Rita’s lack of tenderness and raw emotion. I’ve been through the same metamorphosis as her…it’s a brutal transition where you often resort to the fetal position. Rawness between women should be shared so we feel a kinship!
3) There was an mild arrogance to Rita that I found mildly distasteful.
In all fairness, writing the kind of book that would have deeply resonated with me would have been a brutal, soul wrenching experience and much easier said than done.
adventurous
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
I, like many reviewers before me, have mixed feelings about this book. I enjoyed the descriptions of people, places, food, and culture that occurred throughout this story. However there were a couple of major flaws that made my reading of this very tedious. I could not stand the narrative voice of Gelman because of her privileged, assumptive, and ignorant way of going about her travels. A direct quote from her book is "Once I leave the U.S., I am not bound by the rules of my culture. And when I am a foreigner in another country, I am exempt from the local rules. This extraordinary situation means that there are no rules in my life. I am free to live by the standards and ideals and rules I create for myself." I understand that something like this is meant to come across as empowering or exciting but in all honesty it feels so disrespectful and entitled. While the directness of her bad attitude softens as she travels more, there are some moments that definitely point to the privileged lifestyle she left behind to become a "nomad." There's a lot more I could say but I'll just leave it at this: Gelman began her travels at a time when such things were unheard of and for that alone it's an intriguing account of the changing world and the perceptions of that particular timeperiod. I think its worth reading but I wish somebody else with a lot more awareness and respect had written it.
adventurous
informative
reflective
relaxing
slow-paced
I give it a 3.5. I enjoyed the book but it wasn't a "can't put it down" situation. I do think it was really interesting because she did the solo travel at a time when it wasn't popular, especially for women, and before the convenience of technology like cell phones, gps, etc.
I enjoyed how Rita described both her internal and external experience of the world around her, and was not afraid to discuss her flaws and difficulties. A little bit of a tendency to wax poetic, but plenty of writers do and I did not feel like that took away from the book.
I struggled with this book. I listened to the audiobook, read by the author, which I always appreciate. But man, the tone of the book really put me off. "Super upper middle class white woman wants to slum it" was the vibe that I got. I appreciate how she wanted to experience the authentic culture of the locations that she visited and the "slow travel", but for some reason I kept going back to that tone and how there was something I didn't resonate with about it.
Could this be partly jealousy for her experiences and the opportunity to just pick up and go move somewhere? for sure. Realistically, this is not something that very many get to do. And I do love reading about others travels, but again, there was just something I didn't connect with about this book. I'm thinking maybe there was a underlying tone of obliviousness to it? I don't know and it would take more introspection than I am currently willing to give.
Could this be partly jealousy for her experiences and the opportunity to just pick up and go move somewhere? for sure. Realistically, this is not something that very many get to do. And I do love reading about others travels, but again, there was just something I didn't connect with about this book. I'm thinking maybe there was a underlying tone of obliviousness to it? I don't know and it would take more introspection than I am currently willing to give.
I wanted this book to read like “Into The Wild”. I wanted that so much and I was severely disappointed. It told me about these spectacular experiences but it didn’t SHOW me. I suppose as long as the author was satisfied with the retelling of her journey. It’s really all that matters I guess. I paid $5 for the book and I’m thankful it wasn’t more.
It was a good read at first. However, i felt as if this book dragged a bit. So i stopped reading for awhile and then decided to pick it back up to finish it.