Photo: HarperCollins
La macchina va dove vanno gli occhi.
- The Art of Racing in the Rain, Garth Stein
I have stopped writing for awhile. Or rather, I haven’t had the time or desire to write. For the past two weeks, all I’ve been doing at work is write – write for North View Primary’s garden eco-trail. I over-stressed, over-wrote. Probably too well trained by university and honours, I rationally tried to squeeze in as much information as I could on the A3 signage – forgetting at times that it’s for primary kids.
In the end, I had to put down my pride and re-learn to stop chanelling this obssessive-compulsive, subconscious need to do a cuter kids’ version of university-style research/content/writing. If there’s a lesson to take away, it’d be the need to write from the perspective of a generation of kids with attention deficit: it’s about visuals and making Brand’s Essence of the main point.
Ha, back to books. In between For One More Day and The Art of Racing in the Rain, there were two:
Photo: Fantastic Fiction
1. Dial M for Merde – I’d read the first two years back, while I was learning French I think, and found the english-french satire pretty hilarious. Short-term crude humour is now less funny when your taste in books has morphed to yearn for something deeper. By picking the Life of Pi to revive my reading desire, I unwittingly set the standards high.
Photo: Pop Culture Madness
2. A Spot of Bother - I enjoyed very much The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, and expected something similar. Much to my dismay for the first half of the book, which was draggy and nothing exceptional. But as I trudged through to the middle, there was a growing sense of something more. By the time I’d flipped to the last pages, I understood. It was about family, relationships and aging – a very real, honest and smart take on life’s courses.
As I browsed the fiction section at MPH bookstore, the turqoise colour and blurred photo of a dog caught my eye. I wanted to get my hands on a second book, together with Dial M for Merde. Just above the intriguing title The Art of Racing in the Rain, there was book review quote:
A novel I can’t stop thinking about.
- Jodi Picoult
I was sold; I couldn’t resist the lingering promise of a story with an heartfelt impact. I’m glad I chose it over the other fiction titles lying nearby. Looking back, it feels like God helped me pick this particular read. The Art of Racing in the Rain turned out to be a book of surprises – who would have guessed F1 (100% unexpected) integrated with a doggy’s narration (the doggy cover was telling)?!
The names of Schumi, Reubens, Senna (and many more drivers) were littered across the book. This on top of vivid descriptions of old-school racing passion, grand prix circuit names /cities and the driver’s perspective of the art of maneouvering his machine around the track.
No race has ever been won in the first corner; many races have been lost there.
The author did a splendid job on weaving together Enzo’s (the doggy) human-like perspective with the eventful life of a husband/father/aspiring race driver. Enzo brought a whole new dimension to narration – he adds an endearing touch and gets you thinking about hhuman behaviour. It was brilliant in effusing racing rawness, without suffocating with technicality. In subtlely blending the philosophy with a family’s story of struggle, the book highlights how the human spirit can be at the mercy of trials and tribulations but it will not be crushed unless you give in and allow it to.
Photo: Focus
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Photo: Ben’s Lumix LX3
A stack of colours.
A Sunday afternoon treat.
One pair is never enough.
Mirror, not.
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