Eat, Pray, Love (2006)

Tortured by the ''giant trash compactor of nonstop anxiety'' that had become her life, journalist Elizabeth Gilbert embarks on a yearlong quest for happiness — and manages to find romance and some killer pasta along the way. Eat, Pray, Love, an insightful, funny account of her travels reads like a mix of Susan Orlean and Frances Mayes. Whether filling in as a one-woman welcoming committee at an ashram in India, inhaling perfect gelato in Rome, or passing time over coffee with a medicine man in Bali, Gilbert becomes, as her guru advises her, ''the scientist of [her] own inner experience.'' Despite a few cringe-worthy turns (''Why have I been chasing happiness my whole life when bliss was here the entire time?''), Gilbert's journey is well worth taking. A

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