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bookishwendy 's review for:
Gold
by Chris Cleave
*note* I received this book as part of the Goodreads First Reads program.
Gold is one of those "important contemporary issues" books in the vein of Jodi Picoult, and explores the relationship between two female Olympic sprint cyclists, one of whom has a 7 year old daughter with leukemia and has had to sit out the past two summer Olympic games due to one emergency or another. Having not yet read Little Bee, I'm spared having to compare the two, though I've heard some of the story elements like the troubled child with the obsession (Star Wars in this case) have been recycled from the previous novel. That said, I enjoyed the fresh (and timely) backdrop of Olympic-level sprint cycling, a sport I'm sure few people know much about, and as a (very much amateur) athlete myself, I identified with the two athletes and the way they allow competition to rule their lives (one more than the other). I also appreciated some of the descriptive writing and the connection drawn between the endless circling on the track and the riders' endless circling in life, always ending up where they start. The characters are distinct and vividly drawn, but an unnecessary "big twist" at the end takes a borderline soap-operatic situation to (for me) unbearable levels of contrived melodrama.
The Big Twist also confuses and obscures what started out as believable character motivations. The mother Kate suddenly morphs from likeable and long-suffering underdog to a self-inflicting martyr--and how on earth did these two women maintain what appears to be a solid friendship for so long? Nice-guy husband Jack similarly becomes a self-centered jerk...and yet I doubt that the reader is supposed to react to the characters in this way. Really, the story would have made more sense without the Twist: it is so incongruous to the larger story I suspect it was added at the last minute, perhaps because the editor wanted to needlessly complicate things. However, I can't quibble with the often lovely writing, nor with the author's portrayal of athletic women who are pretty badass otherwise!
Gold is one of those "important contemporary issues" books in the vein of Jodi Picoult, and explores the relationship between two female Olympic sprint cyclists, one of whom has a 7 year old daughter with leukemia and has had to sit out the past two summer Olympic games due to one emergency or another. Having not yet read Little Bee, I'm spared having to compare the two, though I've heard some of the story elements like the troubled child with the obsession (Star Wars in this case) have been recycled from the previous novel. That said, I enjoyed the fresh (and timely) backdrop of Olympic-level sprint cycling, a sport I'm sure few people know much about, and as a (very much amateur) athlete myself, I identified with the two athletes and the way they allow competition to rule their lives (one more than the other). I also appreciated some of the descriptive writing and the connection drawn between the endless circling on the track and the riders' endless circling in life, always ending up where they start. The characters are distinct and vividly drawn, but an unnecessary "big twist" at the end takes a borderline soap-operatic situation to (for me) unbearable levels of contrived melodrama.
The Big Twist also confuses and obscures what started out as believable character motivations. The mother Kate suddenly morphs from likeable and long-suffering underdog to a self-inflicting martyr--and how on earth did these two women maintain what appears to be a solid friendship for so long? Nice-guy husband Jack similarly becomes a self-centered jerk...and yet I doubt that the reader is supposed to react to the characters in this way. Really, the story would have made more sense without the Twist: it is so incongruous to the larger story I suspect it was added at the last minute, perhaps because the editor wanted to needlessly complicate things. However, I can't quibble with the often lovely writing, nor with the author's portrayal of athletic women who are pretty badass otherwise!