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TheBookFrog

The Book Frog

Books. Book reviews. Bookish thoughts. Living a bookish life. Life in the bookstore.

The Art of Racing in the Rain: A Novel

The art of racing in the rain - Garth Stein Inspiring! Uplifting! It's the next [fill in the blank with a comparable former bestseller here]. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll want to run hug your dog. When a publisher or other corporate entity sells a book this way, I cringe and read something else. And that's what I did for more than a year after the initial publication of The Art of Racing in the Rain. And then I received a reading copy to coincide with the publication of the paperback edition, and while stuck in traffic on a Friday afternoon I opened it up (I swear, traffic was at a standstill; I didn't put anybody's life in jeopardy). By the beginning of the second paragraph ("I'm old. And while I'm very capable of getting older, that's not the way I want to go out.") the tears were starting to well up. That's right, I cried. I laughed. I ran home and hugged my dogs. Enzo, the dog narrator of the story, is an old soul, ready to take the next step on the karmic ladder. "I am ready to become a man now, though I realize I will lose all that I have been. All of my memories, all of my experiences. I would like to take them with me into my next life--there is so much I have gone through with the Swift family--but I have little say in the matter." Preposterous? Yes, but absolutely effective. Enzo is wise beyond his age and station, and it took no time at all for this reader to shed her doubts, take the leap of faith, and simply flow with the narrative. After the deathbed scene in the opening sequence--no spoiler alert needed; the reviewer is giving nothing away by revealing that the dog dies--the story turns to the past and tells the story of Enzo's life with the Swifts: Denny, a would-be race car driver, his wife Eve, and their daughter Zoe. It's a nicely told domestic drama, narrated by a dog and full of doggish insight into the human condition. A blurb on the book from Sarah Cypher writing in the Portland Oregonian says that this "is one of those stories that may earn its place next to Richard Bach's Jonathan Livingston Seagull," as treacly a story of self-actualization pop psychology crap as I've ever read...and loved. Yes, even recognizing its manipulative techniques and Me Generation philosophy I still loved, and love, Jonathan Livingston Seagull. The Art of Racing in the Rain is a better book, but equally as manipulative of the emotions; I spent the last 20 pages sobbing aloud and was deeply satisfied upon finishing. It's a book with a bit of a schtick, but, ultimately, it's about the things that matter most in life: love, family, and loyalty.