I loved this book. This book is the story of Kim and her husband, Brian, who decide to quit their jobs, sell most of their possessions and travel around the world. This move was prompted by Kim realizing that she just wasn't truly happy with life the way she was living it. With that being said, she realized that she had a pretty good life and was grateful for it. She decided to follow her dream to become a writer and to travel.
Before leaving, the couple is given a yellow envelope filled with $1000 cash by a couple that they were friends with. They are given the opportunity to give the money away to people in any way that it made them happy. There were 3 rules- don't overthink it, share your experiences if you'd like and don't feel pressured to give it all away. The book followed their travels through Ecuador, Peru, Nepal, India, Germany, Vietnam, etc. Along the way, you encounter their interactions with other travelers as well as "natives." You read challenges and success stories about their relationships and their travels.

You read books you may like them. But there are very few books with which you can actually connect. The Yellow Envelope by Kim Dinan is one such book. Thanks to the publishers and NetGallery for providing me the ARC of this lovely book which I could relate with.

It was my first time reading a travelogue and second time in a long time reading a memoir. When I had requested this book on NetGallery I actually thought that the book would be boring but because the synopsis appealed to me, I went ahead and requested the book. I am glad I did and read the book as well.

It takes real guts to just give up your daily mundane life and travel. One needs to deal with a lot of things such as societal pressures, risks of not having a stable job, risk of risking your life for something that is just unknown and unpredictable. Kim took that risk and was supported by her husband who also left everything and the couple decided to travel.

They say “All those who wander are not lost”. This quote fits aptly with the experiences that Kim has shared in the book. Probably this is the most honest book I have ever read till date. Kim has not been shy in stating what was going in her life, how (while they were travelling) she just wanted to leave her husband Brian despite being aware of the fact how much he had supported her in all walks of life. She discovered her truer self even more when she started travelling and how travelling made her mindful of her personal state. She didn’t lose herself but instead found what she really wanted from her life.

Words have a tendency to spoil the feelings and thoughts but Kim chose just the perfect words to spill out her feelings. It is her first book and i am amazed at her style of writing. Kim is a natural writer. She not only has the gift of expressing her feelings in simplest of words, but also the description that she has given of some of the mundane things make you visualize and value those mundane things. Some of my favourite quotes –

- “The emptiness inside of me had spread like spilled oil, leaving a stain of darkness in its wake”

- “When I closed the door behind me, it clicked into place and the tiny sound was magnified by utter silence of my surroundings”

- “Ending your relationship carries the loss of possibility of your future together, pain of past and perhaps the fear of being alone”

- “It is the small kindness, so ripe and available yet so rarely exchanged that turn ordinary interactions into miracles”

- Describing India “An incredible, beautiful, hideous cauldron of humanity as stripped and exposed as a skinned deer. If we tried to control our experiences in India, if we tried to make sense of the chaos, we’d hate it. In order to love it, we’d have to accept it just as it is”

- “Enthusiasm is faith set on fire”

- “That was the irony of travel. The bigger the distance between you and the familiar grew, the smaller and safer and friendlier the world felt”

- “The magic of everything was that we would not have become who we became without each other”

The writing is fast, simple and very personal. A reader may actually relate with what the author has written in one way or the other. Her honesty is infectious and will make you ponder about are you really happy in what you are doing or may even force you to ask the important question “are you really satisfied with your life”. If you read this book as her memoir and if you are able to relate it with you life you may love this book. However, if you pick this book learn about her experiences in different countries, you may be slightly disappointed there. She has described the locations very superficially i felt.

One noteworthy thing was that when she began her travel, I felt there was a slight negativity in her writing about the places she visited (probably because a lot was going in her life at that time with herself and with her husband). And as she herself claims that visit to India would change her completely and you can see that change through her writing. The places she visits such as Nepal, Bali, Vietnam, after visiting India, she has described the good things about the places too and not just the negative ones.

I am in love with this book. Not just because the book is about learning to give selflessly but also because of how Kim has described what was going in her life during the travel and how step-by-step she overcame the problems and found the best solution possible.

Will recommend it to all those whose life is probably complicated at the moment and would want some answers. Even if it is not complicated, just buy this book when it is released on 1 April 2017 and enjoy. I am now also an avid follower of her blog.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars

I couldn't wait to read this book - I love memoirs but travel memoirs are my favorite. Kim Dinan and her husband, Brian, make the decision to sell all their house and possessions, quit their jobs and travel the world. They start in Ecuador, with some hiccups, Peru, India, Nepal and Vietnam. Kim is searching for something more than what is expected of her - the house, the job, the mortgage and has a crisis of identity along the way. Before they leave the US on their journey, their friends give them a yellow envelope with money to give away or to use as they see fit. and three rules: #1 Don't overthink it, #2 Share your experiences, #3 Don't feel pressured to give it all away.. Watching how they decide to spend the money (and when they are afraid to) was interesting. The yellow envelope ends up defining some of their thinking and actions during the trip that you would have imagined.

Along the way, cracks that had formed in Kim and Brian's marriage seem to get deeper and they both need time apart to explore if they want to stay together. This is an interesting crisis of conscience to me, as it seems that it would be especially hard to work through those issues a world away from family and friends that would be your first support system.

While I really enjoyed the book, at times the author seems a little selfish and ungrateful for the opportunities she has and for her husband. But this is her story and perhaps that's how she felt at the time. But when I read those parts, I found myself disliking the book more. For all of us that dream of doing something like Dinan did, I would have think that I would have been more grateful for the opportunity, but I guess since I never have given up everything I had to do something similar, I don't know how I would deal with all the adversity that would have come my way. Books like this inspire me to want to get off the beaten path a little more, even if it's just regionally and locally and meet people and see things that are unexpected.

Thanks to the publisher for an ARC via NeGalley on my Kindle in return for an honest review.

I love to travel and was quite intrigued by the idea by the envelope to share with who they thought needed it. I felt that the book could have focused more on those experiences with the envelope than with themselves. I enjoyed learning how a couple grew with their experiences. Kim and Brian were brave to try this experiment out, it can be quite stressful to a relationship. I enjoyed their adventures and the places they visited. They visited places that I probably would not visit. I thought Kim really matured emotionally as the book continued, which made the book more of a memoir than a travel novel. I thought Kim and Brian were brave to share their experiences with us.

For the first half of the book, I was hooked. I'm a huge fan of Eat, Pray, Love and this definitely reminded me of it in a good way. BUT after the first half, it just felt like the story was dragged on and on and on and it would never end. Especially with a book like this one, I feel like the anecdotes could have been pared down and not every single minute of the trip recorded (which I'm sure is not true, but that's what it felt like).

Often things happen for a reason... Serendipity is a beautiful occurrence. As someone planning a 6 month journey backpacking this memoir is a timely reminder about why one travels and the essential goodness out in the world, as well as the transformative power of travel and giving of yourself. I hope I will be able to take the lessons of The Yellow Envelope out into the world. Serendipity is a beautiful thing, as is this novel.

This book has so much potential. The adventure was fun. The relationship turmoil...something that we all went through at some point of our lives, even the happiest couples. But, it need a "Je ne sais quoi" to GRAB you.
That little spice that turns a "good book" into a "must read".

This book was a bit interesting. I was thinking it would be more about the places she traveled, but instead was about her personal journey. Which got a bit annoying hearing about her relationship issues when all I wanted to know about was India. Overall it was an ok book.

Kim and Brian quit their jobs and decide to travel around the world with their savings. A close friend gives them a yellow envelope with instructions to give the contents away.

I had mixed feelings about this book. I was excited about their journey but completely bored by the author’s continually complaining. I felt really bad for Brian, who was forced on the trip and then pushed away. I wish this book had been more about the places she went and people that she had met rather than Kim’s internal dialogue about her marriage.

I went back and forth between three and four stars with this one. It's about a young woman who, along with her husband, leaves her life in Portland to travel the world. I didn't think it was the best writing (some things felt cliched and disjointed), but I liked how different the author's story was. It wasn't the death of a loved or or devastating divorce that set her out on her journey. And she was homesick. And she has to figure out her marriage troubles while traveling. Entertaining read. Definitely makes me want to travel!

I really enjoyed the concept of this book - Different to a usual travel book. The idea of spending the money in the Yellow Envelope for the good is a wonderful gift from friends. There were parts of this book that were compelling - particularly travelling through India. The end half of the book was not quite as strong as the start but there are poignant moments that hold the reader's attention.

I had not heard of Kim Dinan before I read this book. I thought it was an inspiring and wonderful read. It takes a lot of guts to give up a settled life to go travelling. It is very brave to sell everything and give up your job. I loved the idea of the yellow envelope. It was a wonderful gift given to them as well as those who received money from it. This book is about trying to live life to the full and about lessons learned and adventures still to come. It is honestly and simply written and I really enjoyed reading it.

The Yellow Envelope is a memoir of Kim and her husband Brian's travel experiences when they decide to quit their jobs, sell everything, and go abroad with no particular plans. Friends gift them with a yellow envelope of money before they leave to be gifted as they go along, and from their first encounters struggling and failing to give yellow envelope money to it becoming second nature, they learn more about who they are as individuals, as a couple, as people in the world.

This was a fairly large departure from my normal fiction or famous-historical-figure memoir taste, but I thoroughly enjoyed it and found it delightful. While the writing at some points seem a little wordy or rambling with offshoots that weren't necessarily interesting, the overall experiences of living both frugally and generously over a period of greater than a year were conveyed well and descriptively. It is inspirational in the way many books involving travel are, lighting a small flame of jealousy and desire to similarly see the world, but it also was able to capture a very different feel. The author manages to capture well the unique dilemma of traveling - of the fear that sets in at first, of the homesickness that never goes completely away, of the exhaustion of always sleeping in different beds in different houses. And while the author was lucky enough to have had momentous and eye opening experiences, she also conveys the disenchantment and disillusion that can accompany adventuring when it doesn't live up to all your expectations.

While the memoir is filled with some rather gross scenes, it comes off as honest and well-written. I would recommend this for anyone who loves travel memoirs, particularly the gritty kind that showers infrequently and never sees the inside of a five-star establishment of any kind. The concept of the yellow envelope is also fascinating and inspiring in its own right, and should be an interesting read for anyone who spends any time thinking about altruism and how altruism is conveyed and gifted.

Thanks to the publisher for an advance digital copy!