Book Review: "City of Girls" by Elizabeth Gilbert

I've read Eat, Pray, Love but I have to admit that was a while ago now. Actually it was probably less than five years after the book was released, so there. City of Girls was one I had never heard of for some reason. Currently, I am nursing a cut on my finger because a book betrayed me. I'm also running on about five cups of coffee, no food and about two hours of sleep. I exist in the twilight zone but I can appreciate a good book when I read it. City of Girls was a wonderful book. Let's take a look at what it was about...

Our main character, Vivian Morris, is an elderly woman writing a confessional letter to her daughter about her past - exploring the themes of times gone by and the ways in which she caused a scandal. We get this as the frame of our narrative before we are thrown back into the younger life of Vivian. Elizabeth Gilbert is a fantastic writer her, she definitely makes the reader ask 'what the hell was so bad that you had to write a letter of confession to your own daughter?' Apart from this, we get this secretive character established - why did she wait until now? What happened that was so big that she spent the rest of her life covering it up? There are so many questions from the first few pages. I was absolutely hooked from then on.

In 1940, a nineteen-year-old Vivian is expelled from Vassar College for academic failure and sent by her disappointed parents to live with her unconventional Aunt Peg in New York City. I'm not going to lie, but this starts off the story in an intriguing way. We have a woman dealing with the first massive failure of her life who is then shunned by her own parents. Honestly, I really felt for Vivian at this point, there is something deeply tragic about her that you feel in the undercurrent of the book. But her Aunt Peg is a real 'character' if you know what I mean.

Peg runs the Lily Playhouse, a shabby but lively theatre filled with performers, artists, and social outsiders, which becomes Vivian’s new home and education. This is quite extreme for the period of the 1940s where women were still expected to be traditional even though doors were opening very slowly. Vivian discovers a talent for costume design and sewing and thus starts making the outfits for the theatre productions - again though it is something that was still considered 'women's work' she thrives in this setting. Gilbert writes her character as somewhere between someone who is traditional and someone who is longing to break free. She is someone women can relate to, in which every time they make a misstep against themselves they suffer a fate far worse than men do for the same missteps. It is universally relatable and I loved it.

She forms a close friendship with Celia Ray, a dazzling and sexually liberated showgirl - this is someone who is going to change everything about Vivian in terms of the way she thinks about womanhood. Vivian becomes more open with her sexual freedom and becomes embroiled in love affairs that are more dangerous and scandalous than meets the eye. But, when compromising photographs enter the picture, there is something deeply sad and tragic about the book all of a sudden, like the ground disappeared from underneath Vivian's feet. She loses everything. I believe many women, including myself, can relate to the feeling of losing everything - many women, more so than men, often have to start again without complaining. Vivian is a strong-willed human being but even she is pushed to her limit.

There is something magical and horrifying about 1940s New York, for Vivian it is home and it is also strange, weird and yet, liberating. Elizabeth Gilbert gives us a flavour of show-business but also lets us in on what happens when women don't do as they are told. Vivian is a deeply heartbreaking character who I would love there to be more about. There's so much to this book and I honestly believe that if you want to know more about the inner-workings of womanhood in deep crises, then read this book. It is amazing.