The beloved modern classic about a woman who finds love—and herself—from an unexpected source. At thirty-seven, Christine Moore has an overwhelming case of burnout with a frustrating career, a few dead-end romances, and a less-than-perfect figure. Little does she know her life is about to change in a way she could’ve never imagined. “Come out of the shadows, Christine. You’ve spent far too much time hiding in shadows.” These words are spoken to her by a gorgeous man astride a 1340cc Harley-Davidson, mysteriously parked on a moonlit beach near her home. Inexplicably drawn to this stranger—who seems to know everything about her—Christine finds herself surrendering to his words. So begins her remarkable voyage of the spirit that sets her heart and soul free. Suddenly appreciating every precious moment of life, Christine discovers the six wonderous steps that lead to ultimate peace and joy. “A whimsical tale of a journey toward spiritual fulfillment” ( Publishers Weekly ), God on a Harley is the perfect gift for everyone who’s had a broken heart but still believes in genuine happiness. Need a lift? "Entertainment Weekly""The Bridges of Madison County" meets "The Celestine Prophecy" meets "Self Magazine"... Joan Brady is a freelance writer, a registered nurse, and a former lifeguard. She lives in California and is the author of several books, including God on a Harley . God On a Harley 1 I’LL BE THE FIRST TO admit I never understood why they call it The Garden State. I especially didn’t understand why, after a seven-year sabbatical on the West Coast, I actually felt happy to be back in New Jersey. After all, everyone pictures New Jersey with the noxious, industrial fumes hovering over the turnpike in Newark rather than the lush, autumn foliage of the Garden State Parkway. Our state is the butt of every joke on the late-night talk shows, and never do they mention what a good sense of humor we have for enduring all the derogatory remarks. They also wrongly assume we Jersey-ites have a collective inferiority complex from living right next door to New York, the city that never sleeps. No matter. We’re not the ones who got bombed by terrorists either. Maybe someone finally figured we’ve had enough hard luck. Let the critics laugh. We have something New Yorkers will never have, the Jersey shore. Anyone who’s spent even one moonlit or sunlit hour here, will tell you how it can stir the latent romance that dwells in even the most cynical New Yorker’s soul. Jay Leno and the gang can make all the “Joisey” jokes they want, but that’s because they’ve probably never seen it when the white surf is pounding the salt into the evening air and the moon looks like an orange English muffin popping out of a toaster of clouds. That’s how it looked the first night I drove along Interstate 95 and finally pulled up in front of my new apartment complex only five blocks from the beach. I’d made the arrangements from Los Angeles over the phone and had driven cross-country in only four days. For some reason, I’d felt an urgency to get back to all that was familiar to me, and credit cards and fax machines made that kind of a move incredibly simple. Expensive maybe, but incredibly simple. In a way, it even felt good to be back in the old familiar corridors of Valley Community Hospital. In spite of dire warnings from West Coast friends who said I’d have a hard time getting a nursing position, thanks to the rampant “downsizing” of hospitals lately, I immediately got a job. Ironically, I was hired back into my old position of three-to-eleven Charge Nurse on the Surgical Trauma Unit. Even though I was suffering from a world-class case of nursing burnout, there was a certain comfort in the familiarity of the well-worn hallways and stairwells that held so much history for me. I felt something like a battle-weary soldier who found himself inexplicably drawn to the trenches and foxholes where, at one time, he had fought for his very life. During the fifteen years of my nursing career, I’d worked in hospitals all across the country in a never-ending search for a nursing job that didn’t deplete my very soul. I never found one I could bear to make permanent, and now it seemed, I had come full circle. I was back where it all had started, and the memories, most of them unpleasant, intruded like uninvited guests. I must have walked at least a million miles through these old, paint-chipped corridors and climbed the back stairs enough times to circle the moon. The gray, cement-block walls were the same ones I’d leaned against many a night, so bone-tired that my back felt like a pack mule and my feet felt like two dead clumps of flesh hanging off my ankles. But there had been an up side too. I’d managed to fall in love a time or two in this old, crumbling House of Wretchedness. Oh, those were the days. Stolen kisses in empty elevators. Steamy moments in deserted stairwells. Faces obscured by surgical masks with eyes that said things