Boston dragon boat-racing event excites, unites

"No matter what the politics of the day or the difficulties or challenges we might face as a country or an area, I think the arts always bring us together and create social cohesion," he said. "And the festival is one of the biggest and best ways to bring all of the different communities of Cambridge together to celebrate the Chinese culture and history."

Roger Jones also enjoys dragon boat racing and the spirit behind it. He is the author of The Final Victory, the first and only novel to center on the thrills and challenges of dragon boat paddling and the daunting challenges for a team of 12 men and eight women, all cancer survivors over the age of 50.

"In 2005, I was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer, and a couple of years later, I started paddling with a dragon boat club in Charleston, South Carolina," Jones said. "In 2010, we decided that we wanted to put an all-cancer team together to see if we could compete at the national championship level."

He said he really didn't think they had much of a chance to win, but they won the national championship.

"It was a great honor, and we earned the right to represent our division in Hong Kong the next year," he said, but the team wasn't able to go because some people were ill, and several passed away the next year.

"The book is a novel based on this team and what we did, what we accomplished, and just the inspiration that it brought to a lot of people, and the hope that it brought to people not quitting, giving up and moving forward and achieving something they didn't think they could ever achieve," he said.