Kassia St. Clair's The Race to the Future, the story of the 1907 Peking-Paris "road" rally, suffers from the same sort of pacing issues that the race itself seemed to. Part of the book's struggle is the choice of subject matter. The rally, which took place before the existence of roads in many portions of the course, wasn't close. I don't think it's really a spoiler when this is a historic event: the race was a wire-to-wire win with a margin of victory of several thousand miles. It wasn't close and it wasn't in doubt.

St. Clair, therefore, is left with a race narrative that isn't exactly extremely intriguing. There's a bit of a survival element to the book, but in terms of actual suspense, there is none. Where the book suffers more, in my opinion, are the interceding chapters. Every other chapter, St. Clair tries to conceptualize the race in different manners. Some chapters (and certainly the more interesting chapters) give accounts of the historic and political situations of the portions of the world the rally runs through. The race started in China on the heels of the Boxer Rebellion, ran through Russia merely a decade before the October Revolution, drove through Germany into France on suspiciously wide and well-maintained roads. The chapters that touch on these items are certainly interesting. However, there are other chapters that try to contextualize portions of the race in modern terms which just drag. It's never a good thing when I start hoping for a book to end.

The book is well-researched, filled with an abundance of interesting footnotes. But at the same time, it's just not gripping. There are really only three cars in the race (one drops out on one of the first days, one disappears and reappears suspiciously later but still thousands of miles behind the winner) and no suspense. As an academic work, it's solid. As an entertaining one, not so much.

this was a great historical nonfiction book, it had everything that I was looking for from the description. I enjoyed getting to learn about the automobile element to this. Kassia St. Clair has a great writing style and thought it worked overall and was well researched.

I loved this book. It’s about a lot more than just the race. The book does cover the major legs of the race in just the right amount of detail so that it builds excitement but never gets mired in too much detail. But alternating with these chapters are chapters that look at the broader scope of events such as the relevant history of China and Russia, of telegraphy and of the role of women. Very handily, there are great maps at the front of the book and an overview of the cars and their crews. I am not a fan of car racing but this book was about so much more and it was definitely worth the read. Thank you to Netgalley and Liveright for the digital advance reader copy.

I am grateful to WW Norton & Company/Liveright for providing me with an ARC of "The Race to the Future-8000 Miles to Paris-The Adventure That Accelerated the Twentieth Century," by Kassia St. Clair. Initially I was intrigued by the subject and the possibilities that it affords, but as I read the book, about the misadventures of early twentieth century automobile enthusiasts undertaking a "race" from Peking (modern rendering is Beijing) to Paris, I found myself unimpressed by the basic narrative of the race (in modern terms more a "rally" ) and far more impressed with the accompanying and fascinating contextualization that the author produces. The book is slow going, partly because of this contextualization which is more or less tangential to the central theme--the race itself. That said, the race narrative has its moments although they are few and far between, while the insights offered by the author in the rather discordant essays on context are both relevant and fascinating. I am sure some readers will have more appreciation for the central narrative than I have, and that is as it should be. Nonetheless, I would urge readers not to skip over the long passages on topics relating to everything from horses to public roads and electric cars. There is a wealth of information here for those who are interested and the travails of the participants in the race (the central narrative) juxtapose neatly with the discussions of infrastructure that dominate context. It is fascinating and full of unexpected jewels for the patient reader.

The history of the Peking-Paris race of 1907 has been periodically chronicled since its completion, to varying degrees of accuracy. The author gives it a new treatment with some new information about lingering mysteries and quite a bit of context on geopolitics and automotive history. The chapters on the race itself are compelling, with descriptions of the participants, the route, and the logistics involved being colorful and detailed. The interspersed chapters on topics ranging from Russian tsars to speed limits, are similarly detailed and interesting, but break the momentum of the narrative so that the book occasionally drags (the author herself says in the preface to skip these until later if you just want to follow the race). In the end, the book sets up an uneasy push-pull between the exhilerating modernism of the turn of the century and the profoundly destructive effects it had on the 20th century and, of course, today (environmental harm, car-centric development, mechanized warfare, etc - extrapolate to whatever social ills you can think of). In the end, while the race concludes with acclaimed heroism, the reader is left to wonder that not enough people saw through its utopian promises.
Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC.