Exploring America's Bygone Paths: A Bicycle Journey with The Buddha and the Bee

Rick Meyers: The Buddha and the Bee is a fun read about a biking trip from Minneapolis to California. I enjoyed Cory's recount of his ride and some of his offerings of local trivia. At times I'd preferred more of the biking story and less trivia, but it was fun nonetheless.
Thanks for sharing your story.

United States on Oct 15, 2023

Valuegal: This surprised me. I enjoyed it but I don’t know why. The author is truthful, and oh so reckless. I really wonder if I would like him in the flesh, but he kept me reading.

United States on Jul 23, 2023

mkral: I really enjoy books about long distance cycling, mostly ones about riding across the US (because that seems to be the most popular book of the type out there).

Many of them seem to fall into the same format, primarily listing the starting & ending city of each days ride, plus what they ate & a description of where they stayed. This book is a little more fleshed out than that, with some interesting side discussions on related topics.

Author is entertaining & the book is a quick read. I do wish the ride were longer to make for a longer book, but it's enjoyable as is.

United States on Jul 02, 2023

CAJ128: Good things:
This book is very readable. It goes fast. It would be great for sitting on a beach or by a pool, i.e., light, fluffy reading. The author (he calls himself the hero) comes across as fairly likable, and he is even occasionally witty.

Other thoughts:
I found the writing style jarring. The story does not flow. Each paragraph is only about a sentence or two long and one minute you are reading about his biking experience, and the next, with no warning, he jumps to a factoid, then another unconnected factoid, and another without tying back to the story. It was disruptive and felt a little ADD. The book reads as though he wrote his "biking across America" story and then realized that since he wrote the book 19 years after the events occurred and couldn't remember all the details he filled in lots and lots of random superficial facts to make the book longer. (Plus double spaced the text, and like I said, each paragraph was only a sentence or two, plus lots of white space all helped reach ~300 pages).

The other thing was there is absolutely no Buddha and no Bee in this book. I was expecting some sort of spiritual adventure journey of discovery (hence, his...

United States on Mar 30, 2022

E.R.: This is the story of an everyday guy trapped behind his desk and his bike ride. His planning goes as far as the next day. There is plenty of history and humor, but it is NOT your typical memoir. I have read a few of these bike travel stories (trying to motivate myself). This is the first book to address some of the realities of biking across country...the mental exercises, self-motivation necessary for a solo bike ride. The first book to address the loneliness and depression, the first to address poor planning (there are a few examples in here). All too frequently, the author of a bike memoir is a super athlete or former military special forces. Cory Mortensen was a desk jockey, more of an everyday guy.
I thoroughly enjoyed Buddha and the Bee. Very impactful, very relatable.

United States on Mar 06, 2022