In this riveting true story of courage and resilience during the coronavirus outbreak, a bold girl on a bicycle races against time across India to save her father and control her own destiny.
With a mysterious virus infecting people the world over, spreading faster than science can keep up, India is in lockdown. Train, plane, and bus services have been suspended to check the contagion. Far from home and frightened, poor migrant workers like Jyoti’s father, who labor in the city and send money home to their families, are beginning to flee by the millions.
Jyoti has been caring for her dad, who is seriously injured and cannot escape on foot. She knows that if they don’t leave now, there’s a good chance they won’t both make it back home alive. Does she have the grit, iron will, and stamina to pedal 700 miles to safety on a rickety hot-pink bicycle with her 250-pound father on the back? Even with the support of unexpected friends, this will be the challenge of a lifetime.
This rich tapestry of a young teen’s celebrated feat weaves together historical, political, and personal backdrops, exploring themes of social pressures, prejudice, family, income inequality, and government failure as well as the age-old bondages of caste and gender.
Suhasini Raj is a New Delhi–based reporter in the South Asia bureau of the New York Times and coauthor of The Bicycle Girl, a picture book account of Jyoti’s story for younger readers. She has covered everything from the rise of Hindu nationalism under Prime Minister Narendra Modi to how India fared with COVID-19 to gender justice and climate change. In 2021, she and her colleagues won a Human Rights Press Award for a video revealing the plight of stateless Muslims in India.
Garen Thomas [JH1] is the New York Times best-selling author of the children’s book Yes We Can: A Biography of President Barack Obama and coauthor of The Bicycle Girl, a Junior Library Guild Selection. She produces cable and network television programs and has written for a variety of media, including AERDF’s Reading Reimagined program and the Smithsonian Institute’s Our Shared Future: Reckoning with Our Racial Past multimedia initiative. She has also edited numerous award-winning books for several publishers, including Scholastic and the Disney-Hyperion imprint Jump at the Sun. [JH1]Just tweaking this one to match the edited jacket bio.
In this riveting true story of courage and resilience during the coronavirus outbreak, a bold girl on a bicycle races against time across India to save her father and control her own destiny.
With a mysterious virus infecting people the world over, spreading faster than science can keep up, India is in lockdown. Train, plane, and bus services have been suspended to check the contagion. Far from home and frightened, poor migrant workers like Jyoti’s father, who labor in the city and send money home to their families, are beginning to flee by the millions.
Jyoti has been caring for her dad, who is seriously injured and cannot escape on foot. She knows that if they don’t leave now, there’s a good chance they won’t both make it back home alive. Does she have the grit, iron will, and stamina to pedal 700 miles to safety on a rickety hot-pink bicycle with her 250-pound father on the back? Even with the support of unexpected friends, this will be the challenge of a lifetime.
This rich tapestry of a young teen’s celebrated feat weaves together historical, political, and personal backdrops, exploring themes of social pressures, prejudice, family, income inequality, and government failure as well as the age-old bondages of caste and gender.
Author
Suhasini Raj is a New Delhi–based reporter in the South Asia bureau of the New York Times and coauthor of The Bicycle Girl, a picture book account of Jyoti’s story for younger readers. She has covered everything from the rise of Hindu nationalism under Prime Minister Narendra Modi to how India fared with COVID-19 to gender justice and climate change. In 2021, she and her colleagues won a Human Rights Press Award for a video revealing the plight of stateless Muslims in India.
Garen Thomas [JH1] is the New York Times best-selling author of the children’s book Yes We Can: A Biography of President Barack Obama and coauthor of The Bicycle Girl, a Junior Library Guild Selection. She produces cable and network television programs and has written for a variety of media, including AERDF’s Reading Reimagined program and the Smithsonian Institute’s Our Shared Future: Reckoning with Our Racial Past multimedia initiative. She has also edited numerous award-winning books for several publishers, including Scholastic and the Disney-Hyperion imprint Jump at the Sun. [JH1]Just tweaking this one to match the edited jacket bio.
