It will be difficult to put down this comical book, as you read of one man's journey from novice to experienced Iditarod competitor. Get an emotional and visual picture of what the competitors - human and canine - go through during this race. It is sure to leave you satisfied. ( )

its awesome with the iditarod. ( )

Award-winning children's author, Gary Paulsen, has another life besides just being a children's author. He draws on his experience as an avid outdoors man to write his amazing books, i.e., Hatchet, Brian's Winter.

Within the first couple pages of Winterdance, Paulsen is careening around in the Minnesota back woods on a sled that is being pulled by a pack of dogs. The book could end right then and there as he goes off the edge of a cliff, but he manages to survive and so do all his dogs. That somehow inspired Paulsen to decide that he wanted to run the ultimate of dog sledding events -- The Iditarod. He titles his book, The Fine Madness of Running the Iditarod because he knows how crazy this pursuit truly is. Yet he begins his preparation as his wife questions his sanity.

There begins a remarkable journey. He has to acquire the appropriate dogs to pull his sled, he has to train himself for the hundreds of hours of running, he has to prepare himself for the lack of sleep and a lack of food. While all this sounds like a trip through Hell, Paulsen tells his tale -- or tail -- in a hilarious and incredible voice. Laugh out loud as you read about him racing through the night woods and being sprayed by skunks so many times he can't even open his eyes by the time he pulls up to his house in the dawn-breaking hour. For awhile he's riding around in a VW bug as his dogs -- some of them as insane as he is -- are pulling him around as if he was in a Radio Flyer red wagon.

As the time draws near to the start of the Iditarod, Paulsen and his dogs are ready. His description of the beginning of the race is hilarious as he and his dogs run through people's backyards in an effort to find the course! The reader realizes how high the stakes are when he describes the possibility that he could be running along for hundreds of miles, only to discover that he's on an ice flow as he and his dogs pitch off the edge and into the ocean -- never to be heard from again. As he writes about the Burn, and all the other aspects of the race, you will feel all the ups and downs of actually running the Iditarod yourself. One minute you're laughing hysterically, the next minute you're on the edge of your seat trying to read fast enough to know whether he's going to die. Of course in a rational moment you know he doesn't die -- he's gone on to write dozens of books since he published Winterdance. But it's easy to forget that when you're in subzero temperatures, being pulled by 12 crazy running dogs and facing down an angry moose that is about to attack!

I was literally up until 2:00 in the morning last week -- on a weekday with work looming ahead of me in a few short hours, laughing. And this was the third time I've read this book!

It's no surprise to me that this book won an Alex Award years ago. Now, whenever someone asks me to recommend a good book for someone who doesn't like to read, I recommend this one! Given that I've read it three times and recommended to no less than 50 people, there has been plenty of time for me to hear back from all those reluctant readers and not one has come back to me to tell me that they didn't like it. In fact, everyone I've recommended it to has come back to tell me how much they loved it, especially the part about Paulsen eating the moose chili. Yep, that's the part I was laughing about at 2:00 a.m. Pick up this book and laugh out loud! ( )

Well written and funny, it is equal parts introspection and comedy. There is a lot of action in this book, a lot of danger, and even some tears. ( )