All the Way to the River cover art

All the Way to the River

Love, Loss and Liberation

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All the Way to the River

By: Elizabeth Gilbert
Narrated by: Elizabeth Gilbert
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About this listen

 Bloomsbury presents All the Way to the River, written and read by Elizabeth Gilbert.

In her first non-fiction book in a decade, the no. 1 bestselling writer who taught millions of readers to live authentically (Eat Pray Love) and creatively (Big Magic) shows how to break free.

In 2000, Elizabeth Gilbert met Rayya. They became friends, then best friends, then inseparable. When tragedy entered their lives, the truth was finally laid bare: the two were in love. They were also a pair of addicts, on a collision course toward catastrophe.

What if your most beautiful love story turned into your biggest nightmare? What if the dear friend who taught you so much about your self-destructive tendencies became the unstable partner with whom you disastrously reenacted every one of them? And what if your most devastating heartbreak opened a pathway to your greatest awakening?

All the Way to the River is a landmark memoir that will resonate with anyone who has ever been captive to love – or to any other passion, substance or craving – and who yearns, at long last, for liberation.©2025 Elizabeth Gilbert (P)2025 Bloomsbury Publishing Plc Editors Select Grief & Loss Personal Development Women Heartfelt Inspiring Thought-Provoking

Editorial Review

Addiction, loss, and healing
Elizabeth Gilbert first inspired us to journey toward ourselves in Eat, Pray, Love. In her latest memoir, she takes us down a rockier path toward self-actualization as she contends with the loss of her life partner, Rayya, and their individual struggles with addiction. Gilbert invites us along as she confronts and overcomes the rawest edges of herself: codependency, denial, people pleasing, and the unique pain of building a healthier relationship to love and sex after unimaginable heartbreak. All The Way to the River is a testament to the power of faith, connection, and determination, urging each of us to envision (through tear-soaked eyes) a better future for ourselves no matter the current circumstances. —Rachael X., Audible Editor

Critic Reviews

Heart-breaking, sometimes harrowing, but with profound honesty, Elizabeth Gilbert asks us to hope. No one who reads this book will ever forget it (Meg Mason)
An absolute masterclass and truth-bomb of a memoir, packed with rawness, courage and poetry. I feel changed by it. The deepest truest manifesto I’ve ever read on recovery, addiction, facing yourself and what it means to belong. I think many people will be shaken awake by this book (Emma Gannon)
All stars
Most relevant
I felt like a fly on the wall from the start to finish, it was beautiful and painful all in the same breathe

stunningly painful & beautiful

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Liz Gilbert is an amazing storyteller and she made this story of horrors at times and beauty at other times so easy to listen to.
What an excellent service she has done to shine some light on the dark side of addiction.

A beautifully told story of addiction heartbreak and love

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What a beautiful painful tale of love , loss and liberation. A wild wayward life of love

Raw real love

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Liz’s most recent book spoke to the aching parts of me and had me laughing out loud and weeping on the floor at times. Also swearing. I will listen to these truths again and again, to say I needed this book is an understatement. Probably the best thing she’s written and she wrote big magic for christs sake. Thank you

Heartbreakingly honest; a much needed healing listen

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Thank you Liz for again baring everything to show that life is in fact messy, incredible, rough, healing, transformative and so beautiful. You have truly inspired me, again

The core of love and what it is to be human

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An insightful account of love, addiction and dying. Not a light read but worth it.

Honest and beautifully and shockingly narrated.

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The writer, Elizabeth Gilbert, is a highly magnetic writer and storyteller who encapsulates the essence of her life into strings of words and sentences, creating new cords and sounds for my soul! Truly felt so gifted for the opportunity to witness this story. I am forever changed from this encounter.

Deeply healing and emotionally raw

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She’s done it again - Elizabeth Gilbert has told her story the only way she knows how - with poetic thought and brutal honesty, leaving no stones unturned. A gift to us all.

Raw, emotional, brutal and incredibly honest

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poetic and real and human, thank u Liz for this outpouring from the depth of your heart

so honest! how refreshing!

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Phenomenal and possibly the most powerful book I have had the privilege of reading. Raw. Authentic. Dignity Amongst Chaos. For any of us familiar with addictive behaviors or anyone alive, please read this as you will be a better human for hearing the love story of these two magnificent, inspiringly flawed crazy beautiful women.

Wow! Must Read This Before You Are Dead!

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