Gold by Chris Cleave

Gold by Chris Cleave – 324 pages

Book Blurb:

What would you sacrifice for the people you love? KATE AND ZOE met at nineteen when they both made the cut for the national training program in track cycling—a sport that demands intense focus, blinding exertion, and unwavering commitment. They are built to exploit the barest physical and psychological edge over equally skilled rivals, all of whom are fighting for the last one tenth of a second that separates triumph from despair.
Now at thirty-two, the women are facing their last and biggest race: the 2012 Olympics. Each wants desperately to win gold, and each has more than a medal to lose.

My Review: 4 stars

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Honestly, if readers didn’t compare this to Little Bee also by Chris Cleave, and just reviewed this book on its own merit, it would get much higher praise. I really enjoyed the intricate, fragile yet deeply woven relationships between the three racers, a daughter and a coach. Not only did I get a glimpse into the world of Olympic racing but also the reasons that young kids, leave their childhood behind to do nothing else but train.
Cleave has a terrific knack for metaphors and they are used thoughtfully throughout the book. This book holds several plot twists and was a quick page turner. I highly recommend.

Quotes I liked:

A single day with that family had felt like the whole of her life. She didn’t know how they could bear it. There was an insane amount of emotion, but nothing sufficiently concentrated to cry about at any particular second. It was impossible.”

– “There was a language of sleeping together and most men shouted it. Even good lovers became strident in sleep: fidgeting, sprawling, holding on to you. As if you needed to be held. As if it was against all odds that you had managed, for thirty-two years, not to fatally injure yourself by tumbling out of your own bed due to the absence of a relative stranger to anchor you.”

– “Sex was cheap money that you could print on demand and use to buy a reprieve from loneliness till morning.”

– “She knew it wouldn’t be true unless she looked back. She was certain that if she could ride faster than the news, the news would never reach her. This was the hour in which she began to emerge distinctly from the main fluid of time. She and time were oil and vinegar shaken up and left to stand: they began to separate back into magic and water.”