The Art of Racing in the Rain Book Review
The Art of Racing in the Rain was
written by Garth Stein. Enzo, the main character that is a dog, narrates his
life as it happens. From being born on a farm and remembering when he was adopted
by Denny as a pet to helping Denny with Eve when she ends up getting sick.
Maxwell and Trish, known as the Twins to Enzo, are Eve’s parents. After Eve
gets sick, the Twins decide to have Zoë, Eve and Denny’s child, stay at their
house with them since Eve is also staying there as she recuperates. This at first
seems like a very warm and loving gesture, but as the story goes on the true
intentions of the Twins begin to come to light. Was it a loving gesture? Or was
it something entirely different? What makes this book even more interesting the
besides the fact that it is told from a dog’s point of view is that, the dog
has human qualities. It can think just like a human so the story has the
quality of language similarly to that of a person. From riding along in an
actual racecar to just sitting in next to Denny watching old racing tapes, Enzo’s
life as a dog is nothing short of a roller-coaster ride as he goes from
attacking a zebra, to riding in an actual racecar, and then getting hit by an
actual car. Stein’s work will have the reader crying and laughing at the same
time.
Setting
was very interesting in this book. It really helped to create suspense where it
was needed in the book as well as make the book more enjoyable to read. Stein’s
vivid description of the courthouse really shows the power of setting. Even
though most of that certain part of the book was fabricated in Enzo’s head, it
still shows the complexity of the setting. As narrated by Enzo, “The new Seattle courthouse: glass walls and
metal beams” (294). From this description of the courthouse, the reader
understands that there are many important decisions that happen in that
building as well as it being a big part in Denny’s life. It is where Denny goes
along with Mr. Lawrence, to help argue for Denny’s case in getting custody of Zoë
back. While this description of the courtroom might be a little brief, the
reader can visualize what the courtroom looks like. This is really just one example
in the book where Stein’s writing really tends to encapsulate the reader with
the description of various places in the book. It is with these very intricate
details about various settings in The Art
of Racing in the Rain that the reader is able to feel like they are
actually in the book especially regarding places like the old house that Denny
used to live in, as well as inside the racecar when Enzo is riding along with
Denny. This shows how important setting is in general, especially in this book.
Another
element to The Art of Racing in the Rain
that really helped to make the story interesting to read and follow were the
characters and how the characters were really quite complex throughout the
story. There are many different types of characters throughout the book. There
is Denny who is a car mechanic and a race car driver. There is Eve who is Denny’s
wife and has an art degree. Then at the same time, there is also the Twins who
have a lot of money and want to make sure that Zoë does not necessarily follow
down the path that Denny and Eve had gone down. This “path” could pretty much
be referred to, by them as the “bad” path, since it was not in line with what
the Twins wanted for Eve or Zoë. The characters that have been listed are the
main characters; however, there are some minor characters that really do play a
big role in the story. Mike and Tony are there for Denny in his time of need. Denny
goes to them for support and insight and they in return watch Enzo when Denny
is unable to. They are also there to fill in the necessarily silence with
laughter which happens quite a lot. A perfect example of this is when Enzo
tells Denny not to sign the release of custody papers and instead grabs them
and jumps out the window. This is followed my Mike saying: “If we had a
videotape of that, we could win ten thousand dollars on America’s Funniest Home Videos” (266.) There is Mike adding
laughter into a situation that is a little too tense and gets Denny to lighten
up considerably. Stein does a tremendous job of giving minor characters a
really big part in this book. Normally, these characters would be left out and not
really considered a big role in the book, Stein does the opposite. If it was
not for the minor characters in the novel, such as Mike and Tony, a few major
things would not have happened. The novel would not have been as funny and
Denny would never have been at their house for support, he would have instead
signed the custody papers and the story would be over. This is how important
the minor characters are as well as just the variety of characters in The Art of Racing in the Rain and just
how important of roles they fill.
The
writing style of Stein is something that really helps make the overall book
flow really well. From the insight into the mind of Enzo, to just the overall
story, the writing style of Stein is impeccable. The part of The Art of Racing in the Rain that
really shows off his true writing style is when, Enzo is talking about what
happened in court as well as the part where Enzo is “testifying” on Denny’s
innocence with a device, similar to Stephen Hawking’s device, that makes Enzo’s
voice audible to everybody present. As Mr. Lawrence explains to the judge, “We’ve borrowed a special voice synthesizer
that was developed for Stephen Hawking… [It] reads the electrical pulses of the
inner brain—” (300). This is an interesting concept and it is just one of
the examples throughout the book that really exhibits Stein’s unique writing
style. To come up with such a genius idea of having Enzo somehow talk to the people
in the audience since Enzo was present during the alleged crime, is pure
literary genius. Even though this interaction with Enzo in front of the judge
did not actually happen since it was a dream; Stein still wrote about it and
added some really interesting literary elements for something that in the broad
range of the novel, really did not matter since it did not happen. This just
shows how dedicated Stein was to this novel as well as how unique and
interesting his writing style is as well. This is why in The Art of Racing in the Rain, Stein’s writing style does a very
good job of portraying what the various characters are thinking and feeling.
I
would recommend this novel. All in all this was a decent novel. I normally do
not necessarily like novels about animals because they can be all “mushy” and
the animal normally doesn’t do anything that I would consider “impressive” in
the novel. The Art of Racing in the Rain
was different in a few ways. First, Enzo (the dog) was able to actually do many
different things that were “impressive” such as helping Denny with his problems
in court and simply just being there for Denny. Also, it wasn’t exactly
“mushy.” Sure, there were times throughout the novel where it could have been,
but Stein did a really good job of keeping the novel moving so that it did not
become stagnate. In that aspect, I did enjoy the novel. It is for people that
like to read stories about animals and for people that are open to new ideas
about life as there are some philosophical elements to the novel as well. (3
stars out of 5.)
