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Gold
by Chris Cleave
I’d mentally filed this book under the “perfect to read during the Olympics” heading. Rather than wait for another year I decided I’d use it to get my Olympic fix in lieu of, you know, the actual Olympics.
This is the tale of a very complicated relationship between Zoe and Kate, premier British cyclists, close friends and closer rivals, who end up having to compete for just one available spot at the London Olympics.
I didn’t always feel the friendship part of their relationship, but I definitely got the complicated aspect, especially when you factored in their coach Tom and Kate’s husband Jack, an Olympic cyclist himself. I thought the character of Zoe was especially well drawn. She was supremely driven and focussed to the exclusion of anything else, but also haunted by a tragedy from her past.
I thought the author did an excellent job of showing just what is involved in high level sports - the long, hard hours of training, the diet, the minute attention to every detail, all the behind the scenes staff and support, and, most crucially the mental aspects. I loved the way he was able to take the reader into the athletes’ heads before, during and after a race, making me feel I was right there with them. Plus, he really knew how to create tension at key plot points.
The only thing about the book that didn’t work for me was all the Star Wars imagery, used to show how Jack and Kate’s daughter Sophie was battling leukaemia. I recognised the author’s intention but for me it interrupted the narrative flow of the adult’s stories - especially the relationship between Kate and Zoe and their quest for Olympic glory- and it was these I was most interested in.
This is the tale of a very complicated relationship between Zoe and Kate, premier British cyclists, close friends and closer rivals, who end up having to compete for just one available spot at the London Olympics.
I didn’t always feel the friendship part of their relationship, but I definitely got the complicated aspect, especially when you factored in their coach Tom and Kate’s husband Jack, an Olympic cyclist himself. I thought the character of Zoe was especially well drawn. She was supremely driven and focussed to the exclusion of anything else, but also haunted by a tragedy from her past.
I thought the author did an excellent job of showing just what is involved in high level sports - the long, hard hours of training, the diet, the minute attention to every detail, all the behind the scenes staff and support, and, most crucially the mental aspects. I loved the way he was able to take the reader into the athletes’ heads before, during and after a race, making me feel I was right there with them. Plus, he really knew how to create tension at key plot points.
The only thing about the book that didn’t work for me was all the Star Wars imagery, used to show how Jack and Kate’s daughter Sophie was battling leukaemia. I recognised the author’s intention but for me it interrupted the narrative flow of the adult’s stories - especially the relationship between Kate and Zoe and their quest for Olympic glory- and it was these I was most interested in.