The Boys in the Boat

It is oftentimes that I feel a smattering of grief when coming to the end of a book. More-so a biography and none more than this particular novel.
1936 is such an age ago, Seattle is possibly as close to the Arctic as I am from the Antarctic and as for Berlin, that is quite literally half a world away. Yet I have come to feel such a connection with these "Boys in the Boat".
I must confess that I didn't really go looking for this particular book. It came to my attention via a search I did in the Book Depository for "Dan Brown" novels. Daniel James Brown, is clearly not the same guy but took a second look as it was a narrative non-fiction which I have enjoyed before in the form of Stephen E. Ambrose's plethora of war stories. But clearly The Boys in the Boat wasn't really that either. I took a chance that I might like it. Look at something a little different to Lee Child or Tom Clancy novels, something a little more cultured, a little more interesting for the fact that it's all true.

To say I enjoyed this book will be a huge understatement.  the narrative was written at pace and with with such clarity that is was easy to follow. The characters described in detail and their challenges and faults laid bare that you can't help but connect with these young men and their determination to succeed.

Synopsis

The Boys in the Boat follows the story of Joe Rantz and his working-class crew mates from the University of Washington as they make their way through qualifying for and finally winning the Olympic Gold in Berlin in 1936. Knowing the ending does not spoil the story one bit, for story lies in the journey there not in the arriving.

Have you read any decent biographies lately?

Author

 Daniel James Brown studied and then taught in California before turning his hand to writing narrative non-fiction full time. The Boys on the Boat is his third novel. He has been nominated and won a variety of awards over the years including being ainalist for the 2007 and 2010 Washington State Book Award for Under a Flaming Sky, The Great Hinckley Firestorm of 1894 and The Indifferent Stars Above, The Harrowing Sage of a Donner Party Bride, respectively.
He won the 2014 Washington State Book Award for Nonfiction for The Boys in the Boat, Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Olympics.

Daniel James Brown, Author of The Boys in the Boat discusses his writing with participants and supporters of the 2013 Lake Leelanau Chase Regatta on October 26, 2013.

Books by the same author:
Under the flaming sky (2006)
Indifferent Stars (2009)