Book Review on The Art of Racing in the Rain

 

{my adorable huge baby puppy dog Moses}

Wow! The month of April went by super fast! This is Chloe by the way. My sweet adorable mother asked me to write a book review on The Art of Racing in the Rain. Well me being the procrastinator that I am... have decided to write it right now! Hey, I wouldn't be me if I did it on time.

Let me just start of by saying that I really enjoyed this book. I laughed. I cried. I got angry. I got sad. I felt happy. I felt every emotion while reading this book. This book is told through the eyes of an adorable dog named Enzo. Enzo reminds me so much of my dog Moses and my childhood dog Cherry Pie. I don't know if that is the reason that I connected so much to this book, but I bet it played a huge part.

The beginning of the book actually starts with the end of Enzo's life. Enzo knows that it's time for him to leave this earth. He is actually looking forward to it though. He truly believes that since he lived a good life as a dog and learned as much as he could about the human race, that he will be able to return in another life as a man. The only thing that is holding him back from leaving is his owner and best friend Denny, and Denny's daughter Zoe. He doesn't want them to be sad and alone. But he knows that he has done on this earth what he was sent here to do.

Denny is a race car driver. It is his passion along with three other things. His wife Eve, his daughter Zoe, and his best buddy Enzo. Enzo watches Denny's life fall apart over the course of several years and stays by his side the entire time. He watches Denny's wife Eve get sick. He knows she is sick long before anyone else knows. He watches Denny go through some serious accusations with a minor and a custody battle over his daughter Zoe with Eve's parents. It is truly heartbreaking to see all the pain that Denny endures. Enzo knows more about it than anyone. He sees things that no one else sees. He develops a love for all Denny's passions as well. He becomes passionate about racing and wants Denny to succeed at it for the both of them. I don't want to give away too much about this book because I highly recommend reading it if you haven't yet.

So rather than tell the whole story I will give you some of my favorite quotes and analogies. There were a lot of great ones throughout this book. Here are a few of my favorites lines from Enzo:

"I will never tire of watching tapes with Denny. He knows so much, and I have learned so much from him. He said nothing more to me; he continued watching his tapes. But my thoughts turned to what he had just taught me. Such a simple concept, yet so true: that which we manifest is before us; we are the creators of our own destiny. Be it through intention or ignorance, our successes and our failures have been brought on by none other than ourselves."

"I had always wanted to love Eve as Denny loved her, but I never had because I was afraid. She was my rain. She was my unpredictable element. She was my fear. But a racer should not be afraid of the rain; a racer should embrace the rain. I, alone, could manifest a change in that which was around me. By changing my mood, my energy, I allowed Eve to regard me differently. And while I cannot say that I am a master of my own destiny, I can say that I have experienced a glimpse of mastery, and I know what I have to work toward."

"People, like dogs, love repetition. Chasing a ball, lapping a course in a race car, sliding down a slide. Because as much as each incident is similar, so it is different."

"The true hero is flawed. The true test of a champion is not whether he can triumph, but whether he can overcome obstacles- preferably of his own making- in order to triumph. A hero without a flaw is of no interest to an audience or to the universe, which, after all, is based of conflict and opposition, the irresistible force meeting the unmovable object...... The sun rises every day. What is to love? Lock the sun in a box. Force the sun to overcome adversity in order to rise. Then we will cheer! I will often admire a beautiful sunrise, but I will never consider the sun a champion for having risen. So. For me to relate to the history of Denny, who is a true champion, without including his missteps and failings would be doing a disservice to all involved."

"She looked over and saw us. She was not a bad person, I knew then. One can never be angry at another driver for a track incident. One can only be upset at himself for being caught in the wrong place at the wrong time."

Please. Go read this book. Any book review I could try to do, just wouldn't do it justice. Also, in honor of the rain theme for April, and another great book, I will leave you with this clip from The Notebook, or The Trapper Keeper as my husband Sean calls it...

check it out here  (for some reason it won't play on the blog so I had to link to it)

Oh gosh I just love the rain. Oh and Ryan Gosling is not too bad either... ;)