Good Read – In the City of Bikes

In The City of Bikes: In The City Of The Story Of The Amsterdam Cyclist

Pete Jordan

Harper Perennial, 2013

451 pages

$15.99 USD/ $17.99 CAD

Reviewed by Duncan Hurd

“Chaos,” as author Pete Jordan explains, is a word most often used to describe the endless stream of Amsterdamers along some of the city’s busiest streets. But behind the seeming chaos is a long history of a city that would not give up the bike.

In the City of Bikes: The Story of the Amsterdam Cyclist is part memoir, part history book. As Jordan shares tales of stumbling unwittingly onto a cycle track and dealing with Amsterdam’s notorious bicycle thieves we also hear historical accounts of life on a bike in Amsterdam, from the late 19th century boom, through Nazi occupation and the threat of automobile dominance in the 1960s.