Unless you count the relay, I have not really been the inspired runner lately. I know for regular visitors to this site this comes as a huge surprise being as I’ve only complained about running and the cold since late November. Okay, and possibly before that, too. For someone that claims to love running so much, I am far from the sport’s poster child right now. The thing I can’t help doing when I feel like this, which is probably every six out of seven runs lately, is look for inspiration. It’s got to be somewhere, right? I mean, there are people out there running all over the place and loving it. Why not me, too? I just have to find it, that nudge to keep going. And to like it.
All this hatin’ on running does motivate me in another way, though. Since the only thing I’ve become really good at lately is avoiding homework (don’t worry, Mom, I am still doing it), I’m finding other things to occupy my time. Last month, the good folks over at VOICE, asked me if they could send me a book called The Monsters of Templeton. I agreed, and waited for the book to arrive. And waited. And then waited more. (Mom, this is the time in which I did my homework.)
Finally, after several weeks of, I’m sure, touring the guts of the U.S. Postal Service, the book arrived. I was through the first few chapters in a day. The author, Lauren Groff, does a stunning job of constructing a would-be complicated story into defined, relatable characters that cross time and generations. Reading about this town, Templeton, and it’s people brings you home into your town, your people. Generally a little daunted by mysteries, I found Groff’s way of weaving in and out of the mysteries of Templeton to be just enough. I can’t help but summarize my opinion of the book by saying it does the things a good novel ought to: It will both take you away, and make you feel a little, too.
And, as an added bonus for me, there are a group of runners that have a strong presence in The Monsters of Templeton. Groff introduces these runners, The Running Buds, with the following:
“We run; we like to run; we have run together for twenty-nine years now; we will run until we can run no more. Until our hips click and shatter apart, until our lugs revolt and bleed. Until we pass from middle age into old age, as we once passed from youth into middle age. . . We run in the morning, when the beauty of our town gives us pause. When it is ours and ours alone. . .”
And there might be some of that inspiration I was looking for, right where I wasn’t looking.
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The Monsters of Templeton by Lauren Groff is available in stores and online now.
Thank you to EveryWomansVoice.com for inviting me to review, once again.
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