A determined 12-year-old girl bikes across the country in this quirky and charming debut middle grade novel. Introverted Bicycle has lived most of her life at the Mostly Silent Monastery in Washington, D.C. When her guardian, Sister Wanda, announces that Bicycle is going to attend a camp where she will learn to make friends, Bicycle says no way and sets off on her bike for San Francisco to meet her idol, a famous cyclist, certain he will be her first true friend. Who knew that a ghost would haunt her handlebars and that she would have to contend with bike-hating dogs, a bike-loving horse, bike-crushing pigs, and a mysterious lady dressed in black. Over the uphills and downhills of her journey, Bicycle discovers that friends are not such a bad thing to have after all, and that a dozen cookies really can solve most problems.

Discusses and exemplifies the importance of relating to others in ways that involve mutual acknowledgment and respect.

This book is one mans attempt to make peace with a world that was on the brink of mutually agreed upon destruction. He chose a bicycle as his medium of expression and named it Friend. His intent was to go from California and head east until going to The Soviet Union. He wanted to meet Soviets and show others that they were alright. He made it as far as East Germany but was not allowed travel any farther east. From there the traveling cyclist heades for the Mediterranean and the Middle East. And then onward around the world. He ran out of money after one year of traveling. He traveled across large continents like Australi and China and circumvented the Philippines, Taiwan, South Korea and Japan. In all he comes away with a world experience and a new way of looking at the planet.

The national bestselling author of A Natural History of the Senses tackles the realm of creativity, by exploring one of the most essential aspects of our characters: the ability to play. "Deep play" is that more intensified form of play that puts us in a rapturous mood and awakens the most creative, sentient, and joyful aspects of our inner selves. As Diane Ackerman ranges over a panoply of artistic, spiritual, and athletic activities, from spiritual rapture through extreme sports, we gain a greater sense of what it means to be "in the moment" and totally, transcendentally human. Keenly perceived and written with poetic exuberance, Deep Play enlightens us by revealing the manifold ways we can enhance our lives.