One of the first true freedoms you experience as a kid growing up is your first bike. It becomes your transportation to explore the world... or at least the local neighborhood! All the kids in my neighborhood had bikes, and we roamed like packs of unwashed hooligans with torn jeans and bloody knees. We stuffed playing cards in our spokes and chewed on black licorice sticks as we rode around looking for the next jumping contest to break out. It was magic! But to a kid, a bike is more than transportation, it becomes an extension of your personality. Everybody's bike was as unique as the person who rode them. Stingrays, 10 speeds, mountain bikes, BMX, cruisers... everybody had something a little different, and they all had their strengths and weaknesses. This is where the idea for the PURPLE BICYCLE came from. Just as a bike might wish it had the abilities of a different make or model, so might a person tend to overlook how truly unique God has created each one us and long for someone else's gifts and talents, color, or ethnicity because they seem better than ours. It's a simple story, but one we all need to be reminded of from time to time.

Hand-illustrated and accessible introduction to the world of bike repair. The first half of this book is a complete repair manual to get you started on choosing, fixing, and riding your bike. The second half reprints all four issues of Chainbreakerzine, whose originals were destroyed in Hurricane Katrina. From publisher description.

This informative picture book shares facts about bicycles and includes fun rhymes, a mini-quiz, a pullout page, and more to keep kids interested as they learn. Full color..

Modern all-road bikes combine attributes that were considered mutually exclusive just afew years ago: comfort and performance. Speed on smooth pavement and on roughgravel roads. A lively feel and the ability to carry a camping load. Handling that is bothstable when the rider is tired and responsive on twisty mountain descents. All-road bikes combine the best aspects of racing, touring and even mountain bikes in just one bicycle.In this book, you'll find out how all-road bikes work and what is important when choosing one. A must-read for cyclists interested in the technology of their bikes, and for every cyclist contemplating his or her next bike purchase.

An unforgettable novel that captures the power of longing, loss, and love, The Time Keepers transports us from 1979 suburban New York to war-torn Vietnam, revealing that sometimes the most unexpected friendships can save us. Two women from different worlds, Grace and Anh, are indelibly changed when a runaway boy is found on a street in their small Long Island town. Brought together by the love of this child displaced by war, the women find friendship and healing from their own painful pasts when their lives intersect with a mysterious wounded Vietnam vet. The vet, Jack, works at the Golden Hours, a watch store that mends timepieces—and might even mend damaged souls. Richman interweaves the journeys of these wonderfully diverse characters who will grip, fill, and break your heart—only to bring them together with the care and precision of an expert watchmaker, one piece at a time. Inspired by the true story of a Vietnamese refugee who entrusted the dramatic account of her escape from Vietnam to the author, and also that of a wounded veteran, Richman sheds light on those whose lives were forever impacted by the devastation of that war.

What begins as the sheer desire for adventure turns into a spiritual quest as a young woman comes to terms with her family, her dreams, and her first love. Tania Aebi was an unambitious eighteen-year-old, a bicycle messenger in New York City by day, a Lower East Side barfly at night. In short, she was going nowhere—until her father offered her a challenge: Tania could choose either a college education or a twenty-six-foot sloop. The only catch was that if she chose the sailboat, she’d have to sail around the world—alone. She chose the boat, and for the next two and a half years and 27,000 miles, it was her home. With only her cat as companion, she discovered the wondrous beauties of the Great Barrier Reef and the death-dealing horrors of the Red Sea. She suffered through a terrifying collision with a tanker in the Mediterranean and a lightning storm off the coast of Gibraltar. And, ultimately, what began with the sheer desire for adventure turned into a spiritual quest as Tania came to terms with her troubled family life, fell in love for the first time, and—most of all—confronted her own needs, desires, dreams, and goals…