As emerging technologies promise to revolutionize the car in coming years, we explore the full spectrum of vehicles in production today. Offering an unparalleled guide to today’s most stylish, innovative and intriguing cars, we go make by make, model by model, to capture a snapshot of a species evolving.
Almost everyone alive uses or interacts with automobiles daily. From affordable off-road workhorses to eye-poppingly expensive limousines, electric urban runabouts to exotic supercars, there’s a car for everyone. Vehicles in turn consume our resources, shape our cities, and reflect our tastes. So in a way they are our rear-view mirror. The automotive decisions of the past fill our streets and breathe our air, populating our cultural memory. Whilst tomorrow’s concept cars always promise bold new directions, just out of reach.
Led by Toyota and Honda, followed closely by Ford and GM, hybrids are now a mainstream idea. Disruptive start-ups like Tesla with their all-electric Model S are spurring industrial giants like BMW and Renault to reinvent themselves for the digital era. Whilst tiny companies like Local Motors suggest new ways to crowdsource designs, and manufacture for micro-niches, the booming economies of emerging markets are birthing their own mass brands, and acquiring storied luxury names, like Volvo, Land Rover and Jaguar.
This book highlights the latest cars that promise to challenge our dependency on fossil fuels, set in a context of the great majority that still don’t. Call it a last hurrah for the dying pleasures of smoking tires, and a deep breath of hope for the new crop of contenders trying to extend the electric frontier. Written to satisfy autophiles without confusing learner drivers, with hundreds of original photographs and illustrations, Cars Now demystifies this rapidly evolving world of motoring for discerning drivers and ambivalent passengers alike.
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