Once a Runner

Well that was something! The second half of "Again to Carthage" was back on topic -- and how.

I still can't figure out why John L.Parker chose to torture his "Once a Runner" readers by having he first half of the book be so, well, ordinary novel-ish. Yes, you can tell I share his gift for words, can't you? Heh heh.

The second half makes up for it. Here's Cassidy back doing what we want to read about - training and racing. One of Boulder's local heroes, Olympic marathoner Benji Durden, has a big role in the final denouement.

No wonder it took him 30 years. John L.Parker obviously decided that having written "the best novel ever written about running", as Runner's World calls it, his follow-up book would be "proper" literature. I'm up to page 139 (of 344) and so far there is precious little running in it. We've had Vietnam war stories, two funerals, fishing trips, family and relationship stuff. John -- this is not what we want; it's not why your "Once a Runner" fans are buying this book.

It's all very well written, but most of the time I am reading it I catch myself silently screaming "Get on with it!"

"If he could conquer the weakness, the cowardice in himself, he would not worry about the rest; it would come.

"Training was a rite of purification; from it came speed, strength. Racing was a rite of death; from it came knowledge.