1 – Prologue – The bicycle is half way between the shoe and the car, and its hybrid nature sets its rider on the margins of all possible surveillance. Its lightness allows the rider to sail past pedestrian eyes and be overlooked by motorized travellers. The cyclist, thus, possesses an extraordinary freedom: invisibility. – Valeria Luiselli, ‘Manifesto á Velo’ A few years ago, after finishing a degree, I was looking for a new job. I’d tried many: private ­tutor, mercenary essay-writer for the rich and lazy, bar- man, gardener, marketing consultant. Three months as a runner at a TV production company were enough of a taste of office life. Days spent tea caddying, photocopying and washing up left me cold. I couldn’t drive, and my bosses told me I needed to learn if I wanted to get ahead in television. I arrived early and left late. Men carrying clipboards with radios strapped to their waists often shouted at me. I couldn’t work the telephone system. I spent my afternoons shredding endless scripts on a temperamental shredder. The only part of the job I did enjoy was the daily run to the edit suites in Soho, over the river from where 1