The Guru Looked Good: An Impious Memoir

The Guru Looked Good tells the real-life story of a young woman leaving her Manhattan life and lover to join an internationally known yoga movement headed by a glamorous female guru -- the same organization and guru featured in the bestseller, Eat, Pray, Love.

Like a fast-paced novel, The Guru Looked Good follows its narrator as she moves up the hierarchy of this international yoga movement to become secretary to Gurumayi – a woman revered as God by hundreds of thousands of people around the globe. Against a lush background of marble fountains, chandeliers, carpeted meditation halls and landscaped gardens from New York to India, we get an inside look at a cult-like world.

Set within a culture where it is impossible to speak – or even think – one’s mind for fear of being disloyal, The Guru Looked Good is the story of a person unable to give up forever what she wants and who she is.

Eat, Pray, Love from the other side of the sticky mat...clear-sighted and true to the bone...
-- Chronogram magazine

Fascinating!...This writing enriched my life.
-- Alphie McCourt, A Long Stone's Throw

The Guru Looked Good is the superb account of one woman's journey through a glass darkly and out the other side. This memoir is a triumph, I couldn't put it down.
-- Abigail Thomas, author of the memoir, A Three-Dog Life

The Guru Looked Good was the best read of the winter. Marta Szabo writes with a searing insight into what would make someone give up their choice to think freely. This is the book people pretend Eat, Pray, Love is, but The Guru Looked Good is the real deal.
-- Martha Frankel, author of the memoir, Hats and Eyeglasses

A gripping, fierce and elegantly written story and fantastic read, Marta Szabo's new memoir, The Guru Looked Good is a must-read for anyone who has ever participated in a toxic relationship of any kind.
-- Suzanne Bachner, writer/director, author of the Off-Broadway hit, Circle

Marta Szabo's deeply insightful writing shares the gifts and trappings of guru culture with such careful and compelling detail that we recognize ourselves at every turn… Her journey is a page- turning triumph of discipline, self-exploration, and following the calling of her own creative heart.
-- Carla Goldstein, director of the Women’s Institute at Omega

Marta Szabo’s memoir hit me like a bolt of lightning – her writing is so direct, forthright, uncluttered. The impact is immediate, compelling – really a page turner.
-- Dan Shaw, psychoanalyst

Should be required reading for memoir writers.
-- Brenda Mantz, writer

This book kept me turning the pages.… It was one of the more remarkable reading experiences I've had lately, and I'm grateful to have read it.
-- Charles Woods, book designer