Color Me Cultured // Memoirs of an Imaginary Friend & The Art of Racing in the Rain

You know those stories that captivate you? The ones where you find yourself in someone else’s shoes, where their life becomes yours for a few hours as you read? Matthew Dick’s book Memoirs of an Imaginary Friend: A Novel is a story of that capacity. I’m not sure if any of you have read Garth Stein’s The Art of Racing in the Rain: A Novel but this book too has that ability. So in some sense you are getting a twofer here today. Both books put you into the driver seat of a completely different life. In Memoirs it’s the life of an imaginary friend, one who just wants to save the autistic boy who loves him and dreamed him into being. In Racing the life and never ending love of man’s best friend is told, from the perspective of man’s best friend.

Neither book has a complete grasp on reality as we see it, but that is what makes both of them so endearing. All throughout life we strive to get perspective, to understand the world and life and how things become the way they are. We want to get into other people’s heads, to figure out why they love us or hurt us. What makes them happy or sad and why; because maybe then we can understand ourselves a little better too. 

These books are told from beings that are there for no other reason than to love us. They see our faults and deficiencies and all the ways we fall short, and they are there at the end of the day to bridge the gaps where we can’t. They help us find our strength, to conquer our fears, to rise up whenever the world feels as though it is beating us down. From an imaginary friend to a dog, there is one thing in life that these books remind us of…we are always loved.

Review by Meredith Rachek of Write Until There is Nothing Left & images via Amazon