The Art of Racing in the Rain - Stein

A Champion Will Emerge

What do you get when you mix Formula 1 racing, with philosophy for living, man's best friend, tragedy, conflict, and a happy ending?  The great American novel.  At least for a man.  I'm not sure what a women would think of this book, but I give it 5-Stars.  Garth Stein's novel, "The Art of Racing in the Rain", is a fabulous encounter with Enzo, or man's best friend in this story, and, as it turns out, it's narrator.  Enzo tells the story of his master's life, or as he calls him, the alpha-human, and is revealed completely through his eyes during his life with him.  Enzo turns out to be an observer of things and quite a philosopher as well.  That is what makes him, as a dog, a truly compelling character.  Enzo's philosophy is within reach of a dog, perhaps, while still sophisticated enough to appeal to a human's higher intellect.  For instance, Enzo is certain that dog's enjoy a higher intellect than other primates such as chimpanzees.  The only restrictions to their social advance is their inability to speak and their lack of an opposable thumb.  He further believes there is a active conspiracy a foot that prevents the evolution of a dog with an opposable thumb through the evidence of the dew claw and the very human (or in humane) practice of removing the dew claw from their pets.  Further, he believes that the dog is fundamentally closer evolutionarily speaking to a human based on the evidence of the existence of the man-dog or werewolf as it were.  This is brilliant deductive reasoning and establishes Enzo as one of the great thinkers in the whole of literary fiction.  He is also the know-er and witness to great human tragedy and faces these heretofore very human understandings with empathy.  "The Art of Racing in the Rain" much like the great manual for living "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance", is not about racing or motorcycle maintenance for that matter.  It is about living life and in this case living a life into which not a little, but a lot of rain must fall, and racing in that rain.  At the finish-line a champion will emerge.