A Deadly Wandering

July 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.

September 15, 2014

Richtel (New York Times) expands upon his Pulitzer Prize-winning reporting on distracted driving by presenting the story of Utah teenager Reggie Shaw, who caused a fatal accident as he texted while driving. This unfortunate event resulted in a passionate police officer as well as a victims' advocate collaborating to seek justice in an era in which reliance on--or addiction to--mobile devices is a common factor in vehicular accidents. Alongside this narrative of Shaw's evolution from stubbornly refusing to apologize to becoming an advocate for stricter legislation about distracted driving, Richtel details the work of a group of neurosurgeons as they research the extent to which technology consumes and controls the mind. While these sections are certainly compelling and relevant, they bog down the text at times. Ideally, these would have a more natural inclusion into the broader narrative of the accident and its aftermath. VERDICT Overall, this is a highly accessible and timely work. Readers of popular narrative and scientific nonfiction will certainly find this to be a brisk and important read.--Ben Neal, Richland Lib., Columbia, SC

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Starred review from July 15, 2014
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 LesMiserablesnear 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.

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