Michael S. Tobin - Riding the Edge: A Love Song to Deborah

I galloped through it. Couldnt help it. It was that good a read. Its beautifully written; my heart is flapping. The romance of adventure has never been so romantic or so adventurous. Michael and Deborah ride their bikes through Europe, and then the Middle East. On these pages you will find the heights of wisdom and introspection, food writing that rivals MFK Fishers. The actual bike path is strewn with magnificent back road scenery and new friends, including the inspired and inspiring as well as the war devastated. But Michael and Deborahs life-changing encounter turns out to be, in fact, between themselves. Yes: to find one another is the real purpose of their journey.

Risa Miller, author of Welcome to Heavenly Heights and My Before and After Life and winner of the PEN Award for best first novel

A t once, a shimmering travel memoir, spiritual quest, and pilgrimage into the heart of a relationship, Riding the Edge is one of the bravest books Ive read this year. When a multicultural couple discards their successful careers and stagnant life to cycle through Europe and the Middle East, their journey takes them to deeper, darker, and ultimately higher places than anticipated.

In captivating prose that captures epicurean delight as deftly as the terror of war, Michael Tobin shares a story of self-discovery, compassion, and divine providence that will have readers redefining the meaning of love and commitment.

Milou Koenings,USA Today best-selling author

T his is an unforgettable love story between a beautiful man and woman, two young people on an unforgettable physical and spiritual journey throughout Europe and the Middle East, seizing life courageously and appreciatively. It is a poem about the humanity of everyday people everywhere, but it is also a truthful and caring encounter with the complexity of the human soul, including the horrors of human destructiveness. The author succeeds in having us join in a celebration of life, even as he also conveys poignant sensitivity to the ultimate Holocaust that befell his people. A page turner you wont want to put down.

Prof. Israel W. Charny, author of The Genocide Contagion: How We Commit and Confront Holocaust and Genocide (2016); A Democratic Mind: Psychology and Psychiatry with Fewer Meds and More Soul (2017); and Psychotherapy for a Democratic Mind: Treating Intimacy, Tragedy, Violence, and Evil (2018)

T obin is a very engaging writer with clear prose. Especially delightful are his passages on landscape, landmarks, and various regional cuisines. The chapters on Paris and Corfu are fascinating and memorable. Score 9 of 10.

Book Life/Publishers Weekly Prize

M ichael Tobins Riding the Edge: A Love Song to Deborah is an extraordinary memoir of a bicycle odyssey in 1980 and how its unexpected and incredible encounters and experiences turned into a life-changing journey.

Along their bicycle journey, they meet people who are survivors of WWII, devastated by the effects of the Holocaust in which their families were killed. This is what drew me into the memoir, these inner journeys. I loved the rich details of people, food, scenery, and weather! Those details brought the bicycle trip to life for me, giving depth to the emotional and spiritual impact of the journey. Michael Tobins memoir is a beautifully written and profoundly personal story of love... it is also thought-provoking and inspiring.

Readers Favorite Review, Highest Rating 5 of 5

T here is not a sense that remains untouched by Michael Tobins love song to Deborah and to their life together. One can smell and taste the forests and the rich and ethnic food, hear the cacophony of gripping personal stories, some painful, some filled with grace, along with the calls and whispers of animals and birds. Ones minds eye envisions the panoramic vistas, both the miraculously gorgeous and those assaulted by the horrors of war.

The moistness of the soil, the coldness of the metals, the fabric of humanity, and the materials of their journey, both gentle and harsh, amid an unending search for resolutionall these create a full-heart and full-mind experience for the reader.

But most of all, this book moves the soul.

Toby Klein Greenwald, poet, journalist, award-winning theater director; recipient, American Jewish Press Association Simon Rockower Awards for Excellence in Jewish Journalism

T he authors love song to Deborah is written in tenderness and truth. It emerges from the depths of his being directly to the readers temperament, and, to paraphrase Joseph Conrad, reaches the secret spring of our responsive emotions. It is a perfect example of making art out of life. The power of this account persists long after the last word is read. Riding the Edge will shake you to the core, make you laugh, cry, and shout in outrage with the author at the suffering Deborah and he witnessed.

This book is a game changer. It will challenge your assumptions, question your choices, and demand nothing less than a deep dive into the question of love and identity.

Daniel Chertoff, author of Palestine Posts: An Eyewitness Account of the Birth of Israel (Toby Press, 2019)

Y ou have done a great job. And you have done something rare: I saw the story. I felt the story. It was palpable. The writing is gorgeous; I laughed, and I cried.

Marion Roach Smith, author and renowned expert on memoir writing

T his is an intimate portrayal of two people who set out on a journey, sparked by longing and driven by a desire to discover their own history and purpose, a journey that takes you across the world and deep into themselves.

Traveling through magnificent vistas and memorable moments, watch them be transformed. Simple meals become spiritual experiences, and chance encounters are serendipitous markers along the road directing them toward a deeper purpose.

Peppered with anecdotes and philosophy, insightful musings and intriguing personas. Each place leaves its mark, each person its imprint. Through the Alps and litter, past castles and sea they travel. Across a traumatized Europe and a war-ravaged Middle East. They face the generational impact of war and the deep meaning of family. With each experience they uncover the humanness that connects us all and the way that love can change everything.

Placed at the intersection of essence and memory, this book is at its very heart a gift, lovingly culled and magnificently rendered, given generously to you the reader so that you too can be swept away in the current of purpose and toward deep meaning.

This inspirational memoir, written with an open heart, will change you.

Naama Heller, author and food critic

T his work is utterly, utterly, infinitely, utterly brilliant. The depth of the authors thinking and breadth of descriptive powers are astounding.

Richard Shavei-Tzion, published poet

R eading this book was a privilege. The writing is brilliant. So vivid I could picture the scenery, taste the food, feel the emotions of pain, sadness, and terror. I cried, laughed, and felt enriched by the experience. I will tell everyone to read it.

Cheryl, reader

R iding the Edge is a compelling story that is beautifully written. It truly, truly is. And within its pages are lessons, thoughts, and experiences that will most definitely resonate with a wide range of readers. It is one of the highest quality pieces this reader has ever reviewed.

The characters are vivid, often humorous, always compelling, and continually unique even as many share thematic stories of violence, either during the Holocaust, World War II, or in the chaos of Lebanon.

James Buchanan, author, ghostwriter, literary critic