54 pages • 1 hour read
Matt RichtelA Deadly Wandering
Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 2014A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
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The Rapid Advancement of Technology
The early neuroscience-based chapters are devoted to the history of attention science, beginning with its inception during World War II, when the research could mean life and death for pilots. The book continues to trace technology’s advancement in the military up through the latter half of the 20th century, when the advancements started happening in the realm of consumer electronics.
According to Moore’s law, computing power doubles every two years or so. This exponential increase in computing power is important because it makes our technological future far more difficult to predict and anticipate. This is crucial in explaining why society has been so slow to understand and adapt to the dangers of texting while driving. At the time of Reggie’s accident, Trooper Rindlisbacher only has a passing familiarity with the concept of texting and driving. Linton and many of the other county prosecutors are at a loss for how the law should treat it. That is one of the cautionary tales the book tells: the quickness with which problems can arise in the clash between humans and technology, and the importance of anticipating such problems.
Missionary Work
The majority of the book takes place in Utah, so the personal story of Reggie takes place in the context of the Mormon community. Reggie’s biggest wish, established early on, is to go on his two-year mission. The story begins with Reggie having to return from his mission early because of a lie he tells. He gets a second chance at going on a mission later in the book and is again forced to leave because of his charges. His desire to find identity through his religion is thwarted multiple times. In the end, Don Linton, drawing on his past and the way he sees institutional religion and spirituality as separate, gives Reggie a new perspective: In a sense, Reggie’s public education work on the dangers of texting and driving is analogous to missionary work.
Fact-Based Reporting versus Investigative Journalism
Richtel has written a densely researched, deep dive investigation into one specific accident caused by texting and driving. However, he punctuates his work with short, matter-of-fact reported stories of other teenagers involved in similar car accidents, both as victims and as perpetrators. The point of this drumbeat of grim fatalities is that unfortunately in our society, the small stories are easy to dismiss as individual incidents of bad luck. Only through a more thorough investigation that connects a wide variety of diverse subjects—like Richtel’s book does with technological innovation, legislative hesitation to impinging on personal freedom, attention and distraction science, and the impact of trauma on the lives of children and families—can readers understand that the phenomenon described by the reported-accident motif is a pattern, not one-off events.
