Girl Runner

December 22, 2014
In 1928, Canada’s “matchless six” won gold at the first Olympics in which women competed in track, serving as the inspiration for this novel about a fictional female runner who races in those historic games. Aganetha Smart, youngest daughter of an Ontario farmer and his second wife, shows natural speed and agility as a child running between her parents’ house and that of her married half-sister. At 16, Aggie leaves the farm for Toronto, where her athletic ability lands her a job at a confectionery whose owner subsidizes women racers. With a coach and training companion, Aggie learns the meaning of competition, then goes on to experience victory, celebrity, love, betrayal, and sacrifice. Her story is revealed through layers of time: 104-year-old Aganetha introduces herself in the prologue, the first chapter begins with adolescent Aggie tending family graves, and the next scene shows two visitors to the 104-year-old’s nursing home—a girl training for the Olympics and her brother, who have a surprising connection to Aggie. Infused with striking imagery and pearls of wisdom, Snyder’s novel attempts to capture how it feels to be a female athlete, an independent woman, and above all a runner. Like the pioneers of 1928, the characters in this novel win gold or get disqualified in the process, go on to modest modeling and acting careers, and disappear from the spotlight, while Snyder focuses on the feelings behind their public triumphs, the emotions beneath their personal turmoil.

November 1, 2014

Canadian author Snyder (The Juliet Stories) opens her novel in a nursing home, where 104-year-old Aganetha Smart, a former Olympian runner long forgotten, lives out the rest of her days until a young couple appears for an unannounced visit. Telling the staff they're making a film about female athletes, the two strangers instead take Aggie on a mysterious journey that jars loose a flood of memories that are revealed unsequentially but add up to a rich life filled with exhilaration--winning a gold medal for Canada in 1928, the first year women were allowed to participate in the Olympic Games--and unspeakable sadness: one by one, she has lost her extensive family to wars, illnesses, estrangement, and, finally, old age, bringing into sharp focus the pain she had been running from. VERDICT Snyder's well-crafted meditation on aging and loss sometimes feels burdened by the ghosts of Aggie's past to truly reach full sprint, but her inspirational protagonist pushing the boundaries of what was acceptable for women in the first half of the 20th century makes this novel a winner.--Michael Pucci, South Orange P.L., NJ

Copyright 2014 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

December 1, 2014
A silenced centenarian harbors a remarkable past in Snyder's (The Juliet Stories, 2012, etc.) latest novel.At age 104, Aganetha Smart has outlived most who would recognize her as a gold-medal-winning runner for Canada in the 1928 Olympics. Despite being ignored by the staff of her nursing home, Aganetha is still mentally spry, with a strong and often humorous inner voice. Her time at the nursing home has been largely uneventful, until one day when a pair of young strangers arrives under the pretense of being distant relatives, and though Aganetha knows this to be untrue-"Everyone known to me is dead, buried, departed, gone, x-ed out from my life, ties severed, bridges burnt, lost, misplaced"-she's eager for a change of scenery and goes along with it. Away from the nursing home, the visitors begin to admit their true motivations. Kaley, a young runner with her own Olympic dreams, claims to be making a documentary about her athletic inspirations with the help of her brother, Max. While Aganetha again knows they're still not being entirely honest, the break from her usual routine is well worth the uncertainty. The narrative leaps back and forth through time, from a young Aganetha surrounded by a family rife with secrets and heartache, to her brief career as an Olympic athlete and model, and finally to the events that lead to the nursing home with little evidence of her prior glory. The present action with Kaley and Max is often lost in the years of memories, though it plays an equally vital role. A tale of family and life after the gold medal that struggles to gain momentum.

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December 1, 2014
In 1928, Canadian runner Aganetha Smart brought home Olympic gold for her country. It was the first year that women were allowed to compete in Olympic track events, and for a while, victory made Aggie a star. Now an embittered centenarian, she spends most of her time in a wheelchair gazing out the window of a nursing home, until the day a young man and woman arrive. Claiming to be distant relations, they take her out for the afternoon. But once outside, they announce an intent to interview the retired athlete for a documentary. They take Aggie back to her ancestral home, and the journey triggers many memories for her, both painful and joyous. Sliding fluidly between past and present in her mind, she faces the demons of her past, and as her story becomes clearer, so does her link to the people who have brought her home. Aggie's strength and independence in a time of gender inequality will be an inspiration to readers in this poignant story of a life and its redemption.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)