Synopses & Reviews
Over 1.2 million people are killed on the road each year. By 2020, road traffic accidents could outstrip stroke and HIV as one of the main causes of preventable deaths. Woodrow Phoenixs dry, sometimes painfully mordant wit, backed up by accident statistics, personal observations and case histories, offers a trenchant analysis of the problems of road users everywhere and the risks we all take every day. Rumble Strip surprises, challenges, asks us questions that badly need answers and makes us think about things we may prefer to ignore. But sometimes we all need a wake-up call: Woodrow Phoenix personalises the experience of the commuter, the driver, the pedestrian, the accident victim because any one of them could be you.
Synopsis
Rumble strips alert us to hazards. The noise, the jolt, the vibration of those grooves at the edge of the road wakes and prevents drivers from going off the edge of the road. Sometimes we all need a wake-up call: over 1.2 million people are killed in road traffic accidents around the world each year. By 2020, road traffic accidents could outstrip stroke and HIV as one of the main causes of preventable deaths. Whether we drive cars, ride motorbikes, pedal bicycles, take public transport or just walk, we all use roads and rely on each other to drive responsibly. Rumble Strip surprises, challenges, asks us questions that badly need answers and makes us think about things we may prefer to ignore. Woodrow Phoenix's dry, sometimes painfully mordant wit, backed up by accident statistics, personal observations and case histories, offers a trenchant analysis of the problems of road users everywhere and the risks we all take every day. With sharp, densely inked graphics, he immerses us in the narrative as if we are driving those cars or walking along those streets. He personalises the experience of the commuter, the driver, the pedestrian, the accident victim...because any one of them could be us.
Synopsis
Woodrow Phoenix's impassioned and beautifully drawn graphic novel questions our love affair with cars, and asks why, when you are in the driving seat, killing other people is not murder. Or even manslaughter. It's... misfortune.
Over 1.2 million people are killed on the road each year. Our increasing dependence on vehicles to ease our crowded lives has led to a critical imbalance in power between drivers and pedestrians - a situation where road deaths are viewed as acts of God, random events with no cause and no recourse, rather than as the result of human behaviour.
Woodrow Phoenix's dry, sometimes painfully mordant wit, backed up by accident statistics, personal observations and case histories, offers a trenchant analysis of the problems of road users everywhere and the risks we all take every day.
Rumble Strip surprises, challenges, asks us questions that badly need answers and makes us think about things we may prefer to ignore. But sometimes we all need a wake-up call: Woodrow personalises the experience of the commuter, the driver, the pedestrian, the accident victim - because any one of them could be you.
About the Author
Woodrow Phoenix is a British comics artist and writer who also works in the fields of editorial illustration, graphic design, font design and children's books. His work is graphic and playful but is unusual for its high degree of formal experimentation. His graphic story "End of the Line" first appeared to much praise in The Brighton Book, a mixed media anthology in association with The Brighton Festival. He is co-editor of Nelson, a collective graphic novel with 54 creators, published by Blank Slate.