The Peerless Four
A Novel
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- $14.99
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
Running so hard you think you'll choke on your next breath. Lungs burning like they're drenched in battery acid. Peripheral vision blurred by the same adrenaline that drowns out the cheers coming from the full stadium. And of course, the reporters. The men scribbling furiously on their notepads so they can publish every stumble, sprain, and sniffle in these historic games.
This was the world of the female athletes in the 1928 Amsterdam Olympics, the first games in which women were allowed to compete (and on a trial basis, at that). Nicknamed "the Peerless Four," the Canadian track team included some of the strongest and most diversely talented women on the scene. Narrated by the team's chaperone—a former runner herself—the women embark on their journey with the same golden goals as every other Olympian, male or female. But as the Olympic tension begins to rise with unexpected injuries, heartbreaking disqualifications, and the pressure of supreme athletic performance, each woman discovers new fears and new priorities, all while the weight of women's future in the Olympics rests on their performance poise.
The Peerless Four is more than a sports novel, more than a record of how far women's rights have come in the past 75 years. It's a meditation on sacrifice, loyalty, commitment, perseverance, and the courage to live a true underdog tale.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Patterson's second novel (after 2011's This Vacant Paradise) relates the fascinating story of Florence Smith, Bonnie Brody, Ginger Hadley, and Muriel Ziegler, who were among the first women to compete in the modern Olympics. The titular foursome, making up the Canadian women's track team, head to the 1928 games in Amsterdam, where female athletes have been permitted to compete on a trial basis. They are accompanied by their chaperone, Marybelle Eloise Lee "Mel" Ross, a onetime runner now fleeing domesticity, and their sponsor, former hockey star Jack Grapes. The team members must all contend with their individual hopes and fears while often facing disapproval from society at large. Mel observes both their triumphs and failures, while admiring, envying, and guiding her charges. After the games, the women must come to terms with another challenge: returning to their everyday lives. Patterson mates genres sports and period fiction and the result is surprisingly rich and resonant. Finding and giving voice to her characters' innermost lives, their best and worst selves, the author not only transcends categories but creates something poignant and memorable.
