The Long Run: A Memoir of Loss and Life in Motion

In The Long Run, Catriona Menzies-Pike seeks to be inspirational when it comes to summarizing the healing power of running. Unfortunately, the memoir comes across as flat and turgid. It’s also filled with some quasi-intellectual chaff. The latter is the case when Menzies-Pike writes as a feminist. It’s interesting, but her heart does not seem to be in it. The topical connection between the sport of running and social oppression is weak, to say the least.

It’s troubling that Menzies-Pike gets some basic details wrong. At one point she writes of “the weight shifting from the ball to the heel of my foot as I moved forward.” That’s not how people run; the heel hits the ground before one’s weight is transferred to the ball of the foot. Was she running backwards?

This slim work may benefit a few by making the case that running can empower a person. Menzies-Pike notes that there’s “nothing… as reliable as running for elevations of mood and emotion, for a sense of self-protection.” Well and good, but there’s something distant about Menzies-Pike’s writing style. A novice runner would be better off reading What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami. Much better off.