Gold

Oh the emotional tugs of a Chris Cleave novel! Beware of kids who are either seriously ill as in “Gold,” or making their way to a new country as in “Little Bee,” or blown up as in “Incendiary.” Usually victims and survivors populate Cleave’s novels and those who discover the very marrow of their lives in desperate, terrible situations.

His earlier novels “Incendiary” and “Little Bee” were riveting storytelling, maybe each had parts of suspended disbelief, but still you clawed your way through them at a rapid pace. His latest novel “Gold” is that way as well, but for me gets the “bronze” compared to his others.

“Gold’s” release is timely as the London 2012 Olympics are about to begin next week. The story is about two female world-class track cyclists who have been teammates, friends and rivals since they were 19, and now that they are 32 they are nearing the competition of their last Olympic Games. Who win the one coveted team spot to go? And what will they sacrifice to get there?

Cleave seems to dangle these till the very end, with Kate the kind, loyal, mother-figure who has missed two prior Olympics pitted against Zoe, the harsh, solitary model-looking gold medalist who will do anything to win. (Even it means sleeping with Kate’s boyfriend and future husband, Jack, a gold medal cyclist himself.)

The Kate-Zoe and Jack triangle spins around, interspersing with narration from Kate and Jack’s sick daughter Sophie, who has leukemia and is obsessed with “Star Wars,” and from Tom Voss, Kate and Zoe’s old, crotchety coach, who missed the ’68 Olympics and has demons of his own.

Everyone is a bit emotionally wounded here (as typical in a Cleave novel), but in this one, world class physical fitness contrasts with the frailties and sickness of a child and the decrepit body of old age. Going for the gold takes on a whole different meaning here, where life and death, family and human bonds are all at risk.

Cleave’s storytelling and dialogue are typically alluring. I thought “Gold” would be the perfect summer fast-read, and it was pretty good in visualizing the rivalry and their velodrome sporting worlds, but it was flat in parts and didn’t exactly rise to the level of his others. The character Zoe is pretty maddening along the way, you want to shake some sense into her and perhaps the rest of them too. The secretness of the scandal toward the end is a bit hard to believe, and the story sort of hits you over the head with its cast and message. I was glad to go for Cleave’s “Gold,” but I just didn’t (overly) love it.