Over the past decade, people have learned about oil contamination in the Ecuadorian Amazon through toxic tours in which a guide brings participants – students, lawyers, environmental activists, journalists, and foreign tourists – to visit contaminated sites. These toxic tours combine personal experience and local knowledge to convince visitors of the immediacy of environmental issues.

Drawing on extensive research and fieldwork, Toxic takes the reader on a visual toxic tour through the Amazon. Following the story of three fictional participants, this graphic novel paints a visceral picture of the waste pits, gas flares, and precarious lives of people in this region. The book challenges the reader to consider what it means to live in a place and historical moment where victims of industrial toxicants are continually required to prove that harm has occurred.

Toxic is a vivid reflection on the role of pollutants in our everyday lives, ultimately asking readers to reflect on how we are each implicated in the production, consumption, and exposure of pollution both in the Amazon and at home.

Amelia Fiske is a senior research fellow in the Institute for History and Ethics in Medicine at the Technical University of Munich.

Jonas Fischer is an illustrator and comic artist and holds a Master of Arts from the Muthesius University of Fine Arts and Design.