What She Left Behind

So I am still down a computer, and therefore my posts are all out of whack. However, since I have been without my computer I have read 3 books and am beginning my forth so I will, no excuses, be back on track after today.
Since it is October (when did that happen?) I decided to get into the Halloween mood. A combination of history and mystery, What She Left Behind  by Ellen Marie Wiseman was the perfect book to ease myself into the eerie, spooky, spirit.

When Isabelle Stone was 7 years old, her mother fatally shot her father while he slept. Ten years later, Izzy is haunted by her memories and her mother's apparent insanity, particularly while exploring the remains of Willard State Asylum. Amongst the ruins, Izzy and her foster mom discover the luggage of patients who apparently arrived and never left, and Izzy becomes attached the the belongings of a young woman named Clara Cartwright.

In 1929, eighteen year old Clara is sent away by her parents when she rebels against their plans. Struggling to prove her sanity and regain her freedom, Clara is subjected to horrendous treatment, from ice baths to insulin induced comas.

The story rotates between Clara's past and Izzy's present, as Izzy struggles to come to terms with what happened to her mother and find the answers to what happened to Clara. It was horrifying and heartbreaking. The treatment of patients at Willard State was disgusting and barbaric, and it was terrifying to think that the mentally ill were once treated in such a way.

What She Left Behind was dark and unpredictable, eerie and haunting. It leaves you feeling sad, thinking of what could have been.

American Blonde

"Being there was like stepping back into another time, one of glamour and hard work, of camaraderie and competition, of fame and beauty and heartbreak and…magic" -Jennifer Niven, American Blonde


I faced a couple of dilemmas with this post. Halfway through the book, I forgot it at a friends house and was without it for a few days (which was torture). When I got it back, I read like hell to finish it in time for Wednesday's post and was still unable to finish it until Thursday. I reached the second dilemma when my computer crashed. But 3 days and my moms computer later, I can finally write about Jennifer Niven's American Blonde. 

American Blonde is about Velva Jean Hart, World War II hero and aspiring Nashville star. On the tail of her heroic experience as a war pilot, Velva Jean is offered a contract at MGM, Hollywoods biggest studio. Aiming to capitalize on her war hero fame, she is cast as Betsy Ross in the studio's Revolutionary War saga, Home of the Brave. Leaving behind her country home, Velva Jean travels to California and is welcomed by her friend and fellow pilot, movie star Barbara Fanning. As MGM's biggest female star, Fanning teaches Velva Jean the ins and outs of Hollywood. Amidst gossip, scandals, infidelity, and prescription pills, Velva Jean discovers that everything is not as it appears.

Following the release of Home of the Brave, Velva Jean and her fellow cast mates visit the home of the movies producer and his retired movie star wife for a view days of celebration. The celebrating soon turns to tragedy when Barbara Fanning is found dead. As the studio execs work hard to cover up the murder and frame it as an accident, Velva Jean works to honor her friends memory by uncovering the truth.

I really enjoyed this book. I love old Hollywood as much as I love reading so American Blonde combined my two favorite things. Though fictional, the story is based on real life MGM employees such as Howard Strickling, Eddie Manixx, and Whitey Hendry, who worked hard to cover up things that threatened to destroy the squeaky clean image of their studio and it's stars. With the addition of real photographs and events, such as the Black Dahlia and The Lipstick Murders, Niven brings the story to life.

I also found aspects of the story and the character of Barbara Fanning to be very Marilyn Monroe-esque. For instance, her failed marriages, her unreliable mother, her intense desire to start a family, and her dependence on Benzedrine and Seconal, in addition to the mystery surrounding her death.

American Blonde was unpredictable, dimensional, and often, sexy. It references my favorite stars, like Clark Gable, Judy Garland, Ginger Rogers, and Gene Kelly, and takes you back to a more glamorous time.


"Louis B. Mayer, and the studio which he ran, belonged to a different era, a different world. A world where men were gentlemen, where women were virtuous, where families were loyal and loving, where pictures hung straighter, grass grew greener, picket fences shone whiter, people danced down streets and sang songs, endings were happy, and everything was sprinkled with magic dust. It was was an idealized America where dreams came true, especially when there were men to protect those dreams and ensure nothing spoiled them"- American Blonde

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

It's official: I am a Junot Diaz fan.

After This is How You Lose Her, I decided it was time to read my original Diaz book, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. Well more precisely, I tried to read another book but couldn't get out of the Diaz fog long enough to get past the first four pages. THEN I decided to start Oscar Wao, and it did not disappoint.

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao is, you guessed it, the story of Oscar de Leon: a.k.a Oscar Wilde a.k.a. Oscar Wao. As a kid, Oscar is handsome, charming, and good with the ladies. But when puberty hits, his looks, charm and ladies disappear. Now covered in acne and 200 lbs of fat, Oscar spends his life in his comic books and video games. Desperate to not die a virgin, he remains a hopeless romantic, falling in love with beautiful girl after beautiful girl only to remain unnoticed. Finally, after years of struggling with his weight, his heartaches, and endless bullying, Oscar discovers his true destiny.

I thought that this book was great. In addition to the life of Oscar, we learn the lives and histories of generations of de Leons. They are brilliant stories of strength, bravery, and survival all tied in with Dominican history. There is a wonderful relationship between Oscar and his sister, as well as a complicated one between mother and child. It is a heartbreaking story of bullying and redemption, told with the same vulgar wit of This is How You Lose Her.

The wondrous thing about Oscar Wao is that in spite of the teasing, in spite of the heart break, he is unapologetically himself. In spite of everyone telling him to change, he remains true to who he is, and in my mind that makes him incredibly admirable and brave.

I recommend The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao to anyone that has ever felt that they don't fit in. I recommend it to anyone that has ever been bullied, been a bully, or witnessed bullying. And I recommend it to anyone that has always dreamt of living a life that is worthwhile.

This Is How You Lose Her

A few months ago, I picked up The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz. I had gotten it off of a list on Pinterest, but hadn't gotten around to reading it yet. During my most recent trip to the bookstore, I notice another book by Diaz. I was initially drawn by the title and figured if Oscar Wao came so acclaimed, Diaz must be doing something right, so I added This Is How You Lose Her to my basket and finished it in one day.
This is the story of Yunior, a man who looks back on the relationships of his life and faces his mistakes. He tells us of his great loves and his short lived flings, and the ways that he destroyed them. The ways that he took relationships for granted, and fought to get them back.
I absolutely loved this book. It was heartbreakingly real. You relate to these women, and you know men like Yunior, and you feel for them all. It was full of passion and regret, but also humor. It was easy to read, as if you were talking with a friend. It was vulgar, but beautiful, and challenges the way that you live your life and love your loves.
I recommend This Is How You Lose Her to anyone who has ever known love and loss. Diaz lays it out for you in a way that shows you how to overcome your heartbreak and learn from your mistakes.

The Story Sisters

I really loved Alice Hoffman's The Red Garden, so I was very excited to begin another Hoffman novel, The Story Sisters. It is the story of three sisters whose bond is challenged and torn as each faces her own fate.
Elv, Claire, and Meg were once inseparable. When their parents divorce upturns everything in their lives, the sisters lean on each other in their own fantasy world. Created by Elv to escape her own secret horror, the world of Arnelle is a special place in which the sisters are safe and brave.
As the sisters grow, Elv struggles with her past and races recklessly towards a dangerous future. Sensible Meg seeks to separate herself from the make believe world of Arnelle, and Claire is torn between the sisters that she loves. The girls face anger, revenge, and tragedy as they discover themselves and create their lives in the real world.
I enjoyed this book, though not as much as The Red Garden. I found Elv to be extremely ingracious and irritating for early part of the book. However, you also feel for her when you learn the secret burden that she is carrying and the lengths she would go to protect her sisters. It was wonderfully written, and I was brought to tears. You want these girls to remain close so badly, and it is heartbreaking to see their lives change.
I do recommend The Story Sisters. It was dark and bewitching, but at the same time heartfelt and promising. It is a story about pain, and coming-of-age, but above all it is a story of the bond between sisters, daughters, and mothers.

The Thirteenth Tale

"I still believe in stories. I still forget myself when I am in the middle of a good book. Yet it is not the same. Books are, for me, it must me said, the most important thing; what I cannot forget is that there was a time when they were at once more banal and more essential than that. When I was a child, books were everything. And so there is in me, always, a nostalgic yearn for the lost pleasure of books. It is not a yearning that one every expects to be fulfilled. And during this time, these days when I read all day and half the night, when I slept under a counterpane strewn with books, when my sleep was black and dreamless and passed in a flash and I woke to read again-the lost joys of reading returned to me. Miss Winter restored to me the virginal qualities of the novice reader, and then with her stories she ravished me"- The Thirteenth Tale

The Thirteenth Tale, by Diane Setterfield, is the story of a world famous author known for her mystery as much as her writing. Aging and sick, Vida Winter decides to finally open up about the mystery of her life and share the truth of her past, and choses to do so with biographer Margaret Lea. Driven by the ghosts of her own past, Lea reluctantly agrees to work with Miss Winter, and together the women confront their secrets.
It was phenomenal. It was magical and beautifully poetic. Twenty pages in, I knew that I loved it. I had hardly any idea what the story was going to be, but the writing in itself already had me hooked. I wanted to read it during every spare minute that I had and when I had less than 100 pages left, I was sorry it was going to end.
As a reader, I love language. I love words that roll beautifully off the tongue. In The Thirteenth Tale, Setterfield creates music with her word choice, and I found myself rereading sentences out loud just because I loved the sound of them. Both the writing and the story were captivating, and very Jane Eyre-esque. It filled you with questions and remained steadily unpredictable. When I got my answers, I wanted to start over from the beginning to piece it all together.
I fell in love with The Thirteenth Tale. It is one of those books that you need to mourn the end of. One where you cannot begin a new book, because you are still lost in its world. It is a story that will stay with you for a very long time.

The Girl Who Came Home

After reading On The Road, I was eager to step away from the renowned award winners and pick up something I found on my own. I was drawn to The Girl Who Came Home for two reasons: the cover photo of the Titanic and it's strategical placement on the sale rack.
Due to my love of history, I have always been fascinated by the Titanic. When I was a little girl, I took out book after book about the ship from the library. Children's picture books that depicted the inside of the ship, history books filled with archival photos, and of course, every Dear America book I could find. I am fascinated by the mystery and romance of such a horrible tragedy.
My interest in Titanic has not faded since I was that little girl in the library, so when I saw it's picture on the front cover of The Girl Who Came Home, I didn't even need to think about it. It was already in my basket.
As you can assume, The Girl Who Came Home by Hazel Gaynor is about a seventeen year old Irish girl named Maggie Murphy who boards the Titanic for New York along with 13 others from her village. Devastated and traumatized by her experience, she doesn't speak of it for 70 years. The story then flashes forward to 1982, when an 87 year old Maggie decides to share her story with her journalist great-granddaughter.
I love this book. Loved it. It was full of mystery, and full of emotion. From the very beginning you wonder who survives and why Maggie's story is shrouded in such secrecy. No surprise, but I cried. Hard. I read it in a waiting room and was happy I was alone so no one could see me sobbing into the pages like a lunatic. What makes it so powerfully moving is that it really happened. Wives really were torn from their husbands, children separated from their mothers, sisters from their brothers. I could not for a second imagine having to walk away from my loved ones like that. It is heartwrenching and devastating.
I was also fascinated to learn that The Girl Who Came Home was inspired by a real group of people on the Titanic. The Addergoole Fourteen was a group of Irish emmigrants that traveled from County Mayo in Ireland. Eleven of the fourteen died aboard the ship, amounting to the largest loss of life from one region. Although names have been changed, Maggie Murphy and her companions are based on these fourteen.
I absolutely recommend The Girl Who Came Home. It was a beautiful depiction of a tragic event. The characters are relatable and likable, and for a nearly 400 page book, it was a quick and easy read.
It is often easy to remember the tragedy of the Titanic as an event in time or an epic movie, but The Girl Who Came Home reminds you of all the 1,517 real people that lost their lives. Those real men, women, and children that had families, personalities, and dreams. Hazel Gaynor did a great job in bringing them back to life, and keeping their memory alive.

On The Road

I have been hearing about On The Road by Jack Kerouac for years. It has been  on every list of award winners, recommendations, and Pinterest suggestions that I have found. I was incredibly eager and excited to read it and discover what all the fuss was about.
Don't hate me. I didn't like it.
For those of you that haven't heard of it, On The Road is based on Kerouac's cross country travels and adventures with his friend Neal Cassady in the late 1940's. Therefore, it is realistic and believable, and definitely gives you the travel bug. However, there is no climax. Kerouac's thoughts and stories run together as he rambles on about his friends, their relationships, and adventures.
I understand and appreciate why it is such a classic and well renowned work. Kerouac's writing and attention to detail is brilliant. His real life portrayal of life in the 40s opens your eyes to how much things have changed, and makes you yearn for a simpler time. But I just didn't enjoy it. I couldn't get into it.
Classic books are difficult, because I think people often say they love them just because they know that they are classic. They feel that they have to love them because everyone does. But I think that it is okay to not like a classically celebrated book. We all know how much I disliked Emma Bovary and her selfish dramas. The point isn't to love every illustrious work that is handed to you, but to be able to understand it and form your own opinion.
Which is what I did. And I'm sure many people will disagree with me. I think that Kerouac is a brilliant writer, and his story was passionate and inspiring. I am glad that I read On The Road, and I would recommend it. Not because I liked it, but because I think it is important for everyone to form their own opinions about widely recognized works. But I will tell you one thing, like it or not, it will definitely give you the urge to jump in your car with your best friend and whatever money you have in your pockets, and drive.

The Bell Jar

On February 11th, 1963, Sylvia Plath took her own life in her England home at the age of 30. Rejected by publishers for being "disappointing, juvenile, and overwrought", Plath's first and only novel remained unpublished in the states. It wasn't until 1971 that The Bell Jar was released to an eagerly waiting America.
Based on Plath's own experiences, The Bell Jar chronicles the break down of "Esther Greenwood" in the summer of 1953. A brilliant, honors student with great potential, Esther spends the summer in New York completing an internship with a high fashion magazine. Throughout the summer and into her return home, we start to see her mentally deteriorate. Finally, after an attempted suicide, Esther is committed to an asylum where she receives electric shock treatments and tries to recover.
When I found The Bell Jar on a list of recommended books, I was unaware of it's story or it's history. I obviously knew of Sylvia Plath, but I didn't know her tragic story. I was also unaware that The Bell Jar was her true experiences. I found it fascinating.
Oftentimes when I go to read classic, highly acclaimed books, I expect them to be dry, complex, and filled with big words and out of date language. With The Bell Jar, I found none of that. Plath speaks openly as a young woman, and although it has been over 50 years since her story took place, it is still relatable. Her struggle to discover who she wants to be and the feelings that she has are timeless.
I really loved this book. It was sad to see how a woman that had everything going for her could break apart.
In the foreword by Frances McCullough, The Bell Jar is said to have "quickly established itself as a female rite-of-passage novel, a twin to Catcher in the Rye". I think this truly is one of those life changing books that every woman should read.

Beautiful Ruins

While I was on my semi-annual, Tennessee book store shopping spree, I bought a new book mark and the quote on it is "Life is like a good book, the further you get into it the more it begins to make sense". Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter is epitomizes that quote. It is that good book.
Back in 1962, during the filming of Cleopatra, a young actress is told that she is dying of stomach cancer and is sent to stay at a tiny hotel in an isolated Italian town. The hotels owner, Pasquale Tursi, is instantly smitten with this beautiful blonde American, Dee Moray.
Flash forward to Hollywood in 2007, and an old Italian man wanders around the lot of a movie studio searching for a woman that he has not seen or heard from in nearly 50 years. The story follows Pasquelle and the group of people randomly joined together in the search for Dee Morray, who seemingly disappeared in 1962.
I thought that this book was fantastic. The writing was beautiful, the story captivating. The very first chapter fills you with questions, and the further you get into the book "the more it begins to make sense". Each chapter takes you through a different story, and you are slowly able to piece together the past.
Centered around Cleopatra, Walter takes a real event and real people and creates a fictional story that comes alive. There were times that I jumped on IMDB because I started to wonder if the story was true.
This is definitely a book I recommend, and have in fact already passed it along. It is unpredictable, yet believable. Easily one of the best books I have read in a while.

The Reading Group

Right before I read The Sisters, I read Elizabeth Noble's The Reading Group. This was the story of 5 women who come together monthly to discuss their books and, consequently, their lives. Through the course of a year, we see the lives and relationships of these very different women change. Together, they experience births, deaths, affairs, divorce, and raising children.
I am torn on this one. I loved the characters. I loved the emphasis on strong female relationships, be it between mother and daughter or between best friends. I related to certain characters and their issues with their relationships. These women were enduring and empowering.
I loved the references to great books and movies (like my favorite, Gone With the Wind :]). And I cried. Granted I had had a glass of wine at the time, but I laid in the tub, book in one hand- white zin in the other, while tears ran unchecked down my face. And we know I love a book that can make me feel that much.
However, I hated that it gave away the endings to the books the women read. Nerd that I am, that would be the one thing I didn't like. I have this never ending, always expanding list of books to read and I was excited to have a book filled with 12 recommendations. But in discussing the books, the characters gave away the best and most important parts and ultimately ruined them for me.
So I guess the bottom line is that I did like The Reading Group, but if I could do it over, I would read their reading list first. But like I said, that could just be me being a nerd.

The Sisters

Well, as of this past Saturday, I am officially a college graduate! What that means for you all is that I finally have time to write about the books that I have been reading for the past few months. Not to mention, I am back in Tennessee and got a little carried about at the bookstore again, so there will be no shortage of books to come either.
Although I have a bunch of books that I am now ready to write about, I'm going to start with the most recent because it was probably my favorite. I found The Sisters, by Nancy Jensen, on a bargain table at the bookstore down here that sucks up all my money. And for the record, I've found that some of the best books are found hidden on the sale tables.
Anyway, it took me a few months to getting around to reading it with that endless list of mine, but once I did I couldn't put it down. It is the story of Bertie and Mabel, two orphaned sisters living with their drunk of at step dad in the 1920s. The girls are all each other has in the world, and Mabel would do anything to protect Bertie. However, on the day of Bertie's 8th grade graduation, she discovers that her step dad has hung himself and her boyfriend and her sister have run away together. Heartbroken, Bertie is left alone with questions and no way to get answers.
The story then follows the sisters and their descendants through the next 90 years and three generations, through the Great Depression, World War II, and Vietnam and into the new millennium. We see how misunderstandings, stubbornness, and silence can change your entire life.
I really enjoyed this book. I loved figuring out the ages of each character every chapter and trying to picture them in that era, from their hair and clothes to the type of music they'd be listening to. I loved the historical references.  And of course, I loved the strong female characters. It was frustrating to know as an outsider that everything would be fixed if Bertie and Mabel just talked to each other instead of remaining alone out of stubbornness and fear. I thought that The Sisters was a great story and taught a great lesson.

Sharp Objects

I have developed an obsession with Gillian Flynn. This woman has easily, and quickly, become one of my favorite authors. Not an easy place to earn.
This is actually not the book that I planned on writing about this week, but after rapidly finishing Sharp Objects, I couldn't wait to write about it. For those of you who read my post on Gone Girl, you know how much I loved it. I was anxious to read other books by Flynn, and Sharp Objects was definitely a worthy follow up.
When Camille Preaker, a journalist from Chicago, is sent back to her hometown of Wind Gap, MO, to cover what appears to be a serial murder of two little girls, she is reluctant to face the dysfunctional family that she has avoided for years: an overbearing, neurotic mother, a half-sister who is practically a stranger, and the ghost of a sister nearly 30 years dead. Flynn intersects the mystery at hand with mysteries of Camille's past, and you are desperate to solve them both.
This book was fantastic. It was dark and disturbing, but mysterious, and at times, oddly hopeful. Flynn is witty and makes things that should disturb you to your core almost relatable. She paints a descriptive picture of the emotions and struggles, and brings to life each dysfunctional character.
I absolutely recommend Sharp Objects. Like Gone Girl, you spend the whole time trying to predict the ending, trying to solve the murder, and every prediction you make is wrong. Even when you think that everything is solved, you are again surprised by the ending.

Recipe for a Happy Life

I am pretty sure that I have already explained what happens to me when I go into a bookstore. I get lost. I feel this overwhelming desire to read every single book on every single shelf, and it gives me anxiety that I can't do that. So now, in order to limit the time and money that I spend wandering the aisles feeling incredibly inadequate, I try to prepare a list of books to look for. But every once in a while, when I have nothing to do and no place to be, I let myself roam. And it was while I was roaming that I found Brenda Janowitz's Recipe for a Happy Life.

I picked it out when I was feeling a little down, and the recipe for a happy life would have been very nice to have. It is the story of Hannah Goodman, a New York City lawyer who retreats back to her grandmothers Hampton home after an unfortunate incident and bad break up with her boyfriend. 

Throughout the course of the summer, Hannah learns that sometimes you have to stop waiting to be happy and just be happy. 

I thought that this book was cute. It was a nice, easy read, and a great pick me up when you are feeling like your life is not going the way you want it to. It was relate able, and I grew attached to Hannah and her grandmother. 

That being said, it was often hard to know what the story line was. There was always so much going on. There is Hannah's relationship with her mother, her dead husband, her grandmothers past, a pregnancy and a choice she must make between two men. Although this gave the story a lot of depth, I was constantly looking for what the story was about. Was it about the relationships between three generations of women? Was it how Hannah survived and moved on after the loss of her husband? Or was it about her choosing the right man?

But then again, maybe that was the point. Maybe there wasn't supposed to be a specific issue, it was just supposed to be life. It is messy, and complicated, and there isn't a story line. 

I did really enjoy this book. It makes you feel like it is normal to be afraid and want to run away, or to constantly feel like you are looking for something more. But the truth is, you can't spend your life trying to be happy or waiting to be happy. The recipe for a happy life is that there is no recipe. Your life is what you make of it. So stop waiting, stop trying, stop worrying, and just be happy. 

The Red Garden

I absolutely love history, and there is nothing better than when it ties into my reading. In The Red Garden, Alice Hoffman traces the history of the town of Blackwell Massachusetts from it's founding in 1750 through the present. Although fiction, The Red Garden was incredibly believable. Hoffman ties in real historical facts and events with realistic and likable characters, and it is easy to forget that the stories aren't real.
Each chapter chronicles a different story in a different year, and Hoffman subtly intertwines the stories and characters as time goes on. You hear mention of characters from the previous stories and it is sad to see young girls grow old and magical moments forgotten.
You are able to see how the town grows from it's original four families, as well as the cultural changes of 250 years. From the Civil War, to the World Wars, to the hippie days of Vietnam and the fashions of the 80's, you see the times change in one small town.
The Red Garden was full of captivating stories of love, passion, tragedy, and survival. They were stories of fiercely strong women, and people struggling to discover who they are and who they are meant to be. It was both dark and magical at the same time, and when I wasn't halfway through I already knew that I would miss it.
I think that this book was fantastic. There is at least one story and one character for everyone to relate to. It makes you appreciate history. It makes you believe in fate.

Gone Girl

The main thing to remember about Gone Girl is this: Whatever you think, you are wrong.

I've been hearing about this book for months, and I finally bought in on my post-Christmas book binge. I knew the story line: A woman disappears on her 5 year anniversary. It had to have been the husband. Right?

I got into the story immediately. It switches between present day Nick (husband) and past diary entries from Amy (wife), and what made it so great was that I sided with each character as I was reading their story. I never knew whether or not Nick killed her, even when it sounded like he was blatantly admitting it. He wanted to connect with his wife, but she had changed. She was cold and nagging, and honestly just a big ol' b-word. 

Then I'd read her chapters. And I found her incredibly relatable. I thought that she was laid back and down to earth. Sure, her marriage had it's problems, but she wanted to fix it. She loved Nick and she was willing to fight for him. She was trying. And he was a sexist a-hole. I couldn't pick a side. I was constantly on my toes. 

And everything that you think is wrong. 

This book was fantastic. There is really no other word to describe it. Every time I formed an opinion, every time I thought I could predict what would happen next, I would be proven wrong. 

Gillian Flynn is a genius. Her writing is easy and witty, and even in the midst of a high anxiety, terribly dramatic scene, she could still make me laugh. Every single character became real to me and I couldn't put the book down. 

I cannot say enough about it. My mind is blown. This is a book that I am going to need to recover from, like when I read Gone With The Wind. It is going to take me some time to come out of this story. 

The Art of Racing in the Rain

I have been hearing about The Art of Racing in the Rain for years now and when I finally got around to picking it up, I wasn't sure what to expect. I honestly didn't even really know what it was about it, but within pages, I was hooked. This is the story of a man fighting a dramatic custody battle, as told by his dog, Enzo.
In the last days of his life, Enzo reminisces about his time with Denny, remembering the very first moment he was chosen out of his liter. He watches Denny fall in love, get married, and start a family, and builds a special and individual relationship with each member of that family. He adores them. They are his. And I grew attached to the characters, too. I felt for them. Whether I loved them or hated them, they were real to me. I appreciated those that were kind to Denny and Enzo, and I was angry at those who weren't.
When Denny's life begins to fall apart, Enzo remains a silent comfort. He repeatedly longs for the words to express his thoughts, but is resigned to nudges and barks, as "gestures are all he has".
It was so heartwarming to see the way that Enzo idolizes Denny. He constantly sees the best in him and believes in him even when he is at his lowest point. It made me look at my dogs and wonder what they were thinking, and spend a little extra time scratching behind their ears.
The Art of Racing in the Rain makes you look at your life and your relationships, because this innocent and enlightened mind of a dog makes you want to be a better person. Enzo has so much to teach about treating others and appreciating the little things, like thumbs and small tongues.
There is something so special about the relationship between a dog and his human, and Garth Stein illuminated that in The Art of Racing in the Rain. Amidst the heartache and drama, the ups and the downs, there is always someone loving and believing in you, even if they don't have the right tongue to form the words.