The New York Times Book Review - Robert Kolker
…Richtel gives Shaw's story the thorough, emotional treatment it is due, interweaving a detailed chronicle of the science behind distracted driving. As an instructive social parable, Richtel's densely reported…compassionate and persuasive book deserves a spot next to Fast Food Nation and To Kill a Mockingbird in America's high school curriculums. To say it may save lives is self-evident…Richtel displays admirable empathy for everyone involved but reserves a special place in his heart for Reggie—impassive and forlorn, monosyllabic but tortured, evasive yet sincere. Shaw's conversion is depicted with revelatory precision, his epiphany realistically subdued and painstakingly gradual.
Publishers Weekly
07/28/2014
A deadly driving-while-texting car crash illuminates the perils of information overload in this scattershot saga of digital dysfunctions. New York Times reporter and novelist Richtel (The Cloud) recounts the story of Reggie Shaw, a 19-year-old Utah man who in 2006 swerved into oncoming traffic while texting his girlfriend; the resulting accident killed two other men. Part of the book is a lucid, interesting account of the developing brain science of how we focus our attention and how it is distracted by the addictive flood of information from our always connected wireless devices and our insistently multitasked jobs. (Researchers tell the author that texting impairs ones driving as much as being drunk.) Interspersed is a drawn-out journalistic account of the accident’s aftermath, with grieving families, legal proceedings that explore the growth of jurisprudence on driving and cell phones, and Reggie’s guilt and subsequent rebirth as an anti-texting crusader. The author’s determination to juice up the science with human interest, emotional anguish, and courtroom drama feels overdone—many figures in the book have their back stories ransacked for extraneous episodes of trauma and abuse. Still, when Richtel lets the research speak for itself, he raises fascinating and troubling issues about the cognitive impact of our technology. Agent: Laurie Liss, Sterling Lord Literistic. (Sept.)
From the Publisher
Richtel’s compassionate and persuasive book deserves a spot next to Fast Food Nation and To Kill a Mockingbird in America’s high school curriculums. To say it may save lives is self-evident.” — New York Times Book Review (Editor's Choice)
“Keen and elegantly raw. ... Not just a morality tale but a probe sent into the world of technology. ... Richtel draws all the characters with a fine brush, a delicacy that treats misery both respectfully and front-on.” — Christian Science Monitor (One of the 10 Best Nonfiction Books of the Year)
“Americans are addicted to their technology, putting us on a modern day collision course with very real consequences. Matt Richtel brilliantly tells the story of the aftermath of a deadly distracted driving crash. His portrait is riveting. I could not stop reading, and neither will you.” — Ray LaHood, former U.S. Secretary of Transportation
“A portrait of our digital age that will deeply frighten you and cause you to reevaluate many common aspects of your ‘connected’ life. ... An extraordinarily important book that everyone—and I mean everyone—should read.” — Douglas Preston, co-author of The Monster of Florence
“A masterpiece of reporting, insight, and empathy. ... A beautiful, cautionary tale that reads like a novel, and that we disregard at our risk.” — Robert Kurson, author of Shadow Divers
“A Deadly Wandering is more than a page-turner. It’s a book that can save lives.” — Nicholas Carr, author of The Shallows
“Matt Richtel’s riveting book is narrative nonfiction at its finest. ... This book should be placed in every school and legislative chamber in the country.” — Jon Huntsman, former governor of Utah
“This book does that most amazing of feats: it makes cutting-edge scientific research feel relevant to the choices we make every time we get in a car, sit at a desk, or talk to our friends and family.” — Charles Duhigg, author of The Power of Habit
“A gripping book. ... This is human drama and the latest knowledge about obsessive technology woven together in memorable style.” — Ralph Nader, author of Unsafe at Any Speed
“A compelling, highly emotional, and profoundly important story.” — Kirkus Reviews (Starred; a Best Book of the Year)
“Illuminates the perils of information overload... Raises fascinating and troubling issues about the cognitive impact of our technology.” — Publishers Weekly
Intensely gripping, compelling, and sobering... A Deadly Wandering gives the potentially lethal risks of the digital age a very human face — one which we can, if we’re honest, readily see in the mirror.” — Winnipeg Free Press (A Best Book of the Year)
“Exhaustively researched. ... Richtel brings a novelist’s knack for unspooling narrative conflict to bear on Shaw’s real-life drama.” — San Francisco Chronicle (A Best Book of the Year)
“Each page is... irresistible. ... A richly detailed and compellingly readable exploration of the ‘clash’ between our brains and the electronic devices that, for many of us, have become essential to ‘every facet of life.’” — Minneapolis Star Tribune
"Fabulously well-researched and brilliantly told. ... Moving and interesting." — Paula Poundstone
Douglas Preston
A portrait of our digital age that will deeply frighten you and cause you to reevaluate many common aspects of your ‘connected’ life. ... An extraordinarily important book that everyone—and I mean everyone—should read.
Nicholas Carr
A Deadly Wandering is more than a page-turner. It’s a book that can save lives.
Christian Science Monitor (One of the 10 Best Nonfiction Books of the Year)
Keen and elegantly raw. ... Not just a morality tale but a probe sent into the world of technology. ... Richtel draws all the characters with a fine brush, a delicacy that treats misery both respectfully and front-on.
Jon Huntsman
Matt Richtel’s riveting book is narrative nonfiction at its finest. ... This book should be placed in every school and legislative chamber in the country.
Ray LaHood
Americans are addicted to their technology, putting us on a modern day collision course with very real consequences. Matt Richtel brilliantly tells the story of the aftermath of a deadly distracted driving crash. His portrait is riveting. I could not stop reading, and neither will you.
Charles Duhigg
This book does that most amazing of feats: it makes cutting-edge scientific research feel relevant to the choices we make every time we get in a car, sit at a desk, or talk to our friends and family.
Ralph Nader
A gripping book. ... This is human drama and the latest knowledge about obsessive technology woven together in memorable style.
New York Times Book Review (Editor's Choice)
Richtel’s compassionate and persuasive book deserves a spot next to Fast Food Nation and To Kill a Mockingbird in America’s high school curriculums. To say it may save lives is self-evident.
Robert Kurson
A masterpiece of reporting, insight, and empathy. ... A beautiful, cautionary tale that reads like a novel, and that we disregard at our risk.
Winnipeg Free Press (A Best Book of the Year)
Intensely gripping, compelling, and sobering... A Deadly Wandering gives the potentially lethal risks of the digital age a very human face — one which we can, if we’re honest, readily see in the mirror.
Minneapolis Star Tribune
Each page is... irresistible. ... A richly detailed and compellingly readable exploration of the ‘clash’ between our brains and the electronic devices that, for many of us, have become essential to ‘every facet of life.’
San Francisco Chronicle (A Best Book of the Year)
Exhaustively researched. ... Richtel brings a novelist’s knack for unspooling narrative conflict to bear on Shaw’s real-life drama.
Paula Poundstone
"Fabulously well-researched and brilliantly told. ... Moving and interesting."
San Francisco Chronicle
Exhaustively researched. ... Richtel brings a novelist’s knack for unspooling narrative conflict to bear on Shaw’s real-life drama.
Winnipeg Free Press
Intensely gripping, compelling, and sobering... A Deadly Wandering gives the potentially lethal risks of the digital age a very human face — one which we can, if we’re honest, readily see in the mirror.
New York Times Book Review
Richtel’s compassionate and persuasive book deserves a spot next to Fast Food Nation and To Kill a Mockingbird in America’s high school curriculums. To say it may save lives is self-evident.
Christian Science Monitor
Keen and elegantly raw. ... Not just a morality tale but a probe sent into the world of technology. ... Richtel draws all the characters with a fine brush, a delicacy that treats misery both respectfully and front-on.
Kirkus Reviews
★ 2014-07-01
A novelist and Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times reporter explores with nearly Javert-ian persistenceone of the early cases of traffic fatalities caused by texting while driving.On Sept. 22, 2006, college student Reggie Shaw, texting inhis truck, veered into the oncoming lane on a narrow highway near Logan, Utah,and struck a car, knocking it into an approaching truck. Both men inside thatcar were rocket scientists with families, and both died. Richtel (Devil's Plaything, 2011, etc.) beginshis account with an MRI of Shaw's brain (he returns to this scene near theend), then reports the crash in detail, following the story to its most recentlegal and emotional conclusions (insofar as there can be conclusions). Healternates his focus throughout: from Shaw and his family, to the victims'families, to the police and legal system, to the legislators consideringtexting laws, to the latest scientific research on how much we can possiblyattend to in our incredibly distracting world (not nearly as much as we think).Readers will be alarmed to discover what science has learned about the dangersdrivers create when they text or talk on the phone. The vast majority of us arejust not capable of doing so safely. Richtel excels at bringing to life hiscast of sundry characters. (Virtually everyone agreed to interviews.) Readersget to know Shaw's parents, the widows, the daughters of the victims, theattorneys on both sides, a judge who keeps LesMisérablesnear at hand (and required Shaw to read it), a victims rights advocate,scientists and, of course, Shaw himself, who emerges as a modest young man (adevout Mormon), a young man who'd never before been in trouble, a young manwho, we eventually realize, could be any one of us.Comprehensive research underlies this compelling, highlyemotional and profoundly important story.
