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OUR FAVORITE PICKS FOR BOOKS, MOVIES & MUSIC. SLOW DOWN AND TAKE SOME TIME TO SNUGGLE UP WITH YOUR CANINE COMPANION. REACH FOR A GOOD BOOK, PLUG INTO A MOVIE, OR LISTEN TO MUSIC ABOUT DOGS. Books reviewed by Anna Cooke.
In Dion Leonard’s book Finding Gobi he not only manages to capture the essence of a little dog through his writing, but does so in such a lovely tale of true grit. It is the story of a marathon runner and a stray dog he encounters in the Gobi Desert. The writer also gives the reader some insight into the mind and heart of a runner. Leonard writes about his demons and why he puts his body through such grueling challenges. Perhaps it was time for him to finally be at peace with who he had become. Gobi was the gift that appeared in his path, as a result. Leonard always raced laser-focused
on winning and being the best. For the forty-two year-old Australian, running had never really been fun. Rewarding and satisfying, but never
laugh-out-loud fun. And then, along came Gobi. The book has six parts, but the story is actually in two.
Gobi finding Leonard is the first part of the story. The second part keeps the reader completely engrossed as Leonard describes his return to China from his home in Edinburgh, Scotland in search of the little dog.
“The day Gobi stood by my side and looked up from my yellow gaiters and stared into my eyes, she had a look about her that I’d never seen. She trusted me from the outset. She even put her life in my hands. To have a complete stranger do that to you, even if it is a four- legged stray, is a powerful, powerful thing.” From Finding Gobi by Dion Leonard. Published by W Publishing Group.
The book has been optioned for a movie
by Twentieth Century Fox Film. There is also a children’s version, “Gobi. A Little Dog With A Big Heart.”
When Leonard first arrives in China for the race, he has
already trained to run the 155-mile route with other ultra- marathoners across the Gobi Desert. He would be facing freezing peaks, incessant wind and miles of desolate, lifeless scrubland. The plan: run a little less than a marathon a day for four days, then almost two marathons on the fifth day with an hour-long sprint for the final six-mile stage. “The races are called multi-stage ultras, and it’s hard to think of a more brutal test of mental and physical toughness,” Leonard writes in the first chapter. “People actually pay thousands of dollars for the privilege of putting themselves through pure agony, shedding up to 10 percent of their body weight in the process.” Did Leonard’s heart soften after meeting Gobi or did
88 THE NEW BARKER
Gobi appear because Leonard’s heart was opening during this particular ultra-marathon? Up until the Gobi Desert run, Leonard ran as a form of escape, to quiet the sadness inside him. However, this run was proving to be different. “
...as I ran in the Gobi Desert, I was no longer running to get away from my past. I was running toward my future. I was running with hope, not sorrow,”said Leonard. Gobi, the dog, ended up running more than seventy miles
over three legs of the race without eating a thing during the day. She had given everything she had to keep up with Leonard over the course of the marathon. He couldn’t just leave her behind. “For every reason I could find for wanting to help Gobi, there were equally strong arguments for walking away,” he writes. The experience of the run across the Gobi Desert had
changed Leonard’s life. “It was only right that in return I should do everything to help change Gobi’s,” he writes. Before the details of bringing her home with him could be worked out, Gobi went miss- ing in one of China’s sprawling cities. Returning to China to find Gobi would prove to be tougher, mentally, than any marathon Leonard had completed. “After everything she had done to stick with me, I couldn’t just forget about her. I couldn’t stop myself from fearing the worst, from doubting our chances, or from
Author and marathon runner Dion Leonard, and Gobi.
feeling the tremendous pain of knowing that, day by day, I was losing her,” writes Leonard. In his search for Gobi, Leonard experiences the huge stray
dog problem in China. He writes that it “
...stems from people buying pedigree dogs, bringing them back to their apartments, and then getting annoyed when the dogs make a mess on the floor or trash the furniture. In a country where there’s so much wealth, dogs are sometimes treated as a fashion accessory – temporary and disposable.” Did Gobi save Leonard? “I don’t think I was lost, but I
know for sure that she has changed me. I’ve become more patient. Rescuing her has healed wounds I didn’t know were within me. In many ways, by finding Gobi, I’ve found myself.”
U
www.TheNewBarker.com
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