Saturday, May 12, 2012

Enlightened Cyclist - Book Review

The Enlightened Cyclist: Commuter Angst, Dangerous Drivers, and Other Obstacles on the Path to Two-Wheeled TrancendenceThe Enlightened Cyclist: Commuter Angst, Dangerous Drivers, and Other Obstacles on the Path to Two-Wheeled Trancendence by BikeSnobNYC

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


Bikesnob's first book was better - much better.

The shtick for Bikesnob's blog entries that are good is that he will write somewhat crudely but amusingly about several different cycling related incidents, perhaps one serious (but not seriously presented), and perhaps two or so others that are not serious at all (like something about some goofy pro cyclist thing that happened) and then tie it up cleverly at the end. His first book was engaging and even if it was really an assembly of small bits and pieces it read smoothly enough. The second book reads like the kid who was told to produce a homework essay of 10 pages but really had no more than five pages to say - but manages to drag it out to 10 pages anyway. I swear that in one place there were two long paragraphs one after another that said the same thing, just worded differently.

One can deduce that Mr Snob didn't expect his first book to sell, so he tried hard - god help us, it even included "bikesnobnyc" stickers in it! (Was I supposed to put those on my bike? Crazy.) This time he seems to have assumed he is now an author so he didn't try much at all - with the results that one gets in such situations.



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