I just finished Elizabeth Gilbert’s brand-new book Committed:  A Skeptic Makes Peace with Marriage.  As one of the millions of readers who loved Eat, Love, Pray–and as a newly single mom after 21 years of marriage–I have a lot invested in the topic of marriage.  Given the fact that Elizabeth Gilbert is a thoroughly engaging memoirist–but not a philosopher or cultural anthropologist–I wondered if the book would be a letdown, a sprinkling of parmesan cheese when I was looking for a thnck slathering of brie….

But I’m getting ahead of myself.  The book is written as part travelogue, part personal meditation, part historical overview of matrimony.  The travelogue results from Gilbert’s sweetheart Felipe, a Brazilian-born Australian citizen, being denied entry into the U.S. and detained by Homeland Security.  Elizabeth and Felipe, both scarred survivors of divorce, are confronted with an ironic “solution” to their dilemma.  If they want to have a future together in the U.S., they will have to get married–after a mass of red tape has been duly unraveled.  During that bureacratic nightmare, they wander.  Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand.  Throughout their sojourn, Gilbert explores the question, “What exactly IS this thing called marriage anyway?”

That question provokes other questions.  Why is it that studies consistently show men to be happier and healthier in marriage than women? What are the reasons for Gilbert’s own deep, lifelong ambivalence toward marriage?

Her attempts to answer her own questions lead Gilbert to a Hmong village in Vietnam (where the question of whether a woman’s husband is a “good husband” is simply met with a baffled stare, to a Laotian weaver’s hut (where a mother wrings her hands over her educated daughter’s uncertain future), and to her own grandmother’s parlor.  It is Elizabeth’s grandmother’s story–the story of a splendid wine-colored coat–that moved me and disturbed me.  In essence, the grandmother took the one possession she prized above all others–the expensive wine-colored coat that made her feel beautiful and chic–and she cut it to shreds during a time of need to make special garments as gifts for her children.

The story reminded me a little of Shel Silverstein’s book The Giving Tree–in one sense a beautiful, pure story of love and self-sacrifice.  But…always, for me, one that carried a hint of horror.  After all, when you get right down to it, the tree was female, and she gladly and generously allowed herself to be cut down to a stump for the prosperity and comfort of a self-centered male.

So, what does Elizabeth end up deciding about her own impending marriage?  Does she make peace with the institution?   Does she find out whether the women in her own family ever came to terms with their wifely sacrifices?

Committed is not a great book–because Gilbert really does do memoir so much better than social commentary.  However, it is one of those worthy books that documents an honest struggle.  And it is worth reading to find out where Gilbert arrives in her personal quest to define and embrace marriage the second time around.

Hey, if reading this review made you ache to have time to read again, it’s time to call Presto Pink for some help.  They will cheerfully assist with just about any household task you can think of–for very reasonable rates.