- Hardcover: 1 pages
- Publisher: Riverhead (HC) (Jun 1 1998)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 157322099X
- ISBN-13: 978-1573220996
- Product Dimensions: 23.1 x 15 x 2.5 cm
- Shipping Weight: 476 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (26 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #1,137,242 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Publishers Weekly
An Indian, Haefele explains at the outset, is a make of motorcycle not built since 1953 but highly esteemed by American bikers in the 1930s and '40s. A Montana tree surgeon and an ex-teacher of creative writing, Haefele (City of Trees) set out to reconstruct an Indian, and that task gives the principal thrust to this memoir. The rehabilitation project involved searching for abandoned machines, negotiating for old parts, purchasing replacement parts when originals were not available and keeping an eye out for "basketcases"?a motorcycle built from a hodgepodge of makes?from which valuable parts may be salvaged. Also included are accounts of the birth of his third child (the first of his second marriage), the vagaries of Montana weather and portraits of other bikers. But all else takes a backseat to the machine, and such a focus limits the book's appeal to readers equally committed to or fascinated by the construction of a what he calls a technological "work of art."
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Kirkus Reviews
An entertaining if somewhat flawed look at how a middle-aged hobbyist finds new meaning in life through rebuilding a classic motorcycle. Haefele is a frustrated novelist and academic who works, albeit happily, as a tree surgeon. Deciding after visiting an annual motorcycle rally to invest in a vintage American-made Indian Chief motorcycle, he finds himself friends with bikers and other assorted characters whom he would normally avoid. In the end, he finds that he has much in common with these folks, even as he has managed to sell his first novel and, by books end, is back on the academic trail chasing down university jobs. Because of the setting (Montana) and motif (motorcycles), Haefele's book is doomed to comparisons with Robert Pirsig's Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. These similarities notwithstanding, Haefele is able to guard himself well from any influence anxiety, though in one particular scene where he uses beer can slivers as a maintenance tool, the similarity is a little too close. Haefele's style is more relaxed and he isnt, for the most part, prone to the didacticism that mires down Pirsig's work. Unfortunately, the bottom begins to fall out when, for instance, the ``naming ceremony'' for his newborn daughter, Phoebe, is juxtaposed against the episode in which he names his motorcycle the ``Millennium Flyer.'' By the end, Haefele has dubbed his biker friend and tree-surgeon assistant Chaz the ``mythical trickster'' who has kept him going on his quest to rebuild his bike, and even more clumsily, he draws open comparisons between the clothes bought for his daughter and the parts bought to help build his cycle when most readers would catch the similarity on their own. These slips are not enough to ruin Rebuilding the Indian, though, which leaves one curious to see his forthcoming novel. -- Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
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First Sentence
ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST, THERE LIVED a handsome young biker named Benny. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST, THERE LIVED a handsome young biker named Benny. Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
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Customer Reviews
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Most helpful customer reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Okay, this book is Zen and the Art of mid-life crisies...,
By Jarson@earthlink.net (East o' the desert AZ) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Rebuilding The Indian (Paperback)
What a wonderful surprise this book was for me. I don't think there is a man over 30 that can't relate to this one. Not that it's just a guy book... Plenty of interest for anyone who has a life... I'm buying five more as gifts!
2.0 out of 5 stars
Didn't fulfill its promise, but I'm glad I read it.,
By johnl@cochranlaw.com (Dallas, TX) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Rebuilding The Indian (Hardcover)
One of the other reviewers perhaps said it best: I really wanted to like this book. As a mid-life motorcyclist (Harley) and pilot, with a penchant for old airplanes and motorcycles, I have long harbored the dream of restoring something really classic; a Harley J, a '32 Ford, a Stearman biplane, etc. So I grabbed the book without a second thought, anticipating a real restoration chronicle. What I got was part soap opera and part Pirsig, with a too-large serving of jobbing out a restoration to various subcontractors, and not enough nuts and bolts. Wish it had been edited bt Tom and Ray Magliozzi (The Tappet Brothers).
5.0 out of 5 stars
best motorcycle book,
By
This review is from: Rebuilding The Indian (Paperback)
this book could be twice as long as it is. it was such an enjoyable read, i just couldn't put it down. i agree with some other reviewers that it is better than "zen and the art of motorcylce maintenance". although actually there is not much going on in "rebuilding this indian", the reader is drawn into the story and follows the recontruction of the classical motorcycle. i can't quite understand why people see parallels in the bike and fred's daughter phoebe, who is born during the rebuilding of the bike. the bike is always in the foreground. the book is for sure no masterpiece languagewise, but this is i think not the intention of the author. i really liked it, and was sad when i finished it!
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