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Two Wheels Good

The History and Mystery of the Bicycle

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Two Wheels Good

Written by: Jody Rosen
Narrated by: Sean Patrick Hopkins, Amanda Carlin, Fred Sanders
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A panoramic revisionist portrait of the nineteenth-century invention that is transforming the twenty-first-century world

“Excellent . . . calls to mind Bill Bryson, John McPhee, Rebecca Solnit.”—The New York Times Book Review (Editors’ Choice)

ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The New Yorker

The bicycle is a vestige of the Victorian era, seemingly at odds with our age of smartphones and ride-sharing apps and driverless cars. Yet we live on a bicycle planet. Across the world, more people travel by bicycle than any other form of transportation. Almost anyone can learn to ride a bike—and nearly everyone does.

In Two Wheels Good, journalist and critic Jody Rosen reshapes our understanding of this ubiquitous machine, an ever-present force in humanity’s life and dream life—and a flash point in culture wars—for more than two hundred years. Combining history, reportage, travelogue, and memoir, Rosen’s book sweeps across centuries and around the globe, unfolding the bicycle’s saga from its invention in 1817 to its present-day renaissance as a “green machine,” an emblem of sustainability in a world afflicted by pandemic and climate change. Readers meet unforgettable characters: feminist rebels who steered bikes to the barricades in the 1890s, a prospector who pedaled across the frozen Yukon to join the Klondike gold rush, a Bhutanese king who races mountain bikes in the Himalayas, a cycle-rickshaw driver who navigates the seething streets of the world’s fastest-growing megacity, astronauts who ride a floating bicycle in zero gravity aboard the International Space Station.

Two Wheels Good examines the bicycle’s past and peers into its future, challenging myths and clichés while uncovering cycling’s connection to colonial conquest and the gentrification of cities. But the book is also a love letter: a reflection on the sensual and spiritual pleasures of bike riding and an ode to an engineering marvel—a wondrous vehicle whose passenger is also its engine. Engineering Popular Culture Social Sciences World Cycling Technology Bicycle History
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From reading the overview I had expectations that this book was more about bicycles and their place in history. While there is some interesting historical context, it is light on details and too often repeated. Much of the book serves as a platform for long narratives that have some vague connection to bicycling. While the author’s passion for two wheeled transport is clear, their rambling prose serves to muddy any comprehensive story arc.

It is also difficult to imagine someone who was once employed as an urban bicycle courier not knowing how to skid brake a fixie.

Too long, not enough about bikes.

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If you read the summary of this book you will get a very clear outline of what's inside.

Jody shares the history which is fascinating enough however the personal stories and experiences is really the heart of this book.

A must read for any fan of the humble bicycle.

An excellent look at where the bicycle has been and where it's going

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