Eat, Love Pray and The Caliph's House

Eat Love Pray by Elizabeth Gilbert is one woman's quest to find peace after a divorce. After jumping from divorce into a love affair that didn't work Elizabeth decided to take a year off and try to fulfill some of her dreams. The first third of her year was spent in Italy because she had always wanted to learn Italian. The second was spent in India with a guru and the third in Bali with a medicine man as her guide. The book worked for me because of her ability to realistically describe her despair and later on, her enthusiasm, with just a dash of humor, when learning about spirituality

The Caliph's House: A Year In Casablanca by Shah is a humorous look at the Moroccan people and culture from an outsider's perspective. Shah does a great job at presenting the humor and affection for the culture when describing disastrous moments (of which there were many) as well as the every day details about his new home. I love these kind of books where expatriate are offered advice by a series of well intentioned but ultimately baffling local residents.