LitPicks Book Reviews—June 2007

Theme—Seeking Wholeness This month's works revolve around those who seek to piece together broken hearts, fill empty souls, and mend divided identities.

Eat, Pray, Love
Elizabeth Gilbert, 2006
338 pp.

Book Review by Molly Lundquist
June 2007
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single woman in possession of a broken heart must be in want of a meal.   —June Austin

Elizabeth Gilbert takes that famous maxim to extraordinary lengths in her smart, delightful book and heads to Italy, where she eats four-months worth of pasta, gelato, calamari, stewed rabbit, pickled hyacinth bulbs, and the best pizza in the world. In the process she puts on 15 pounds, which should endear to pretty much everyone in the over-30 crowd.

The Bone People
Keri Hulme, 1985
464 pp.

Book Review by Molly Lundquist
June 2007
This a powerful, gripping book, with sharply drawn characters who tug at every heartstring. But I need to insert a disclaimer here: it’s not an easy book, and it's not for everyone.

Hulme’s long-windedness, her strange flights of prose or poetry, feel excessive at times. There is also a violent episode which is particularly disturbing though it is critical to the plot.

Till We Have Faces
C.S. Lewis, 1956
313 pp.

Book Review by Molly Lundquist
June 2007
Dismissed by critics at first, Till We Have Faces is now thought by some to be one of Lewis’s most profound works. Certainly it is mysterious, complex, and imaginative—and on any level a wonderful read.

Faces is a retelling of the ancient myth of Psyche and Eros. If you’re unfamiliar with the original story, get hold of Edith Hamilton’s classic Mythology (a book you might want for your personal library). But here’s a stripped down version: