Books Briefly Noted: Bicycle Diaries
The New Yorker, 30 November 2009 [Link]

Since the nineteen-eighties, Byrne, the co-founder of the band Talking Heads, has been using a folding bicycle to get around the world’s major cities, and his new book is both a travelogue and a reflection on gentrifying urban landscapes. A passionate cycling advocate, Byrne rates the bike-friendliness of New Orleans, Istanbul, and points between, and includes an appendix of tips. His observations aren’t always profound (an affluent suburb “seems to be everything we say we want—but sometimes when we get what we want it turns out to be a nightmare”), but the curiosity and the engagement he brings to the subject are as evident here as in his other artistic works. Of Detroit’s squalor, he writes, “Riding for hours right next to it was visceral and heartbreaking—in ways that looking at ancient ruins aren’t. I recommend it.”