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The world's most dangerous roads have a few characteristics in common. They're frequently the only way in or out of a place humans need to get to. They often resemble a wet spaghetti noodle flung at an unforgiving chunk of the Earth's surface. And nearly all of them lend new meaning to the word "road." The treacherous and impenetrable lanes that make this two-part list from A Thrilling Wonder qualify for all of the above. The Russian Siberian Road to Yakutsk should really be called the "nearly impassable gulley of mud." Bolivia's North Yungas road, a collection of hairpin curves and vertical drops, could be reclassified as "a deadly scratch in the mountain's side." And the road leading from Katmandu to Everest's Base Camp deserves some best-selling adventure descriptions of its own. Thinking it's safer to hoof it? Behold China's Xian hiking "trail"—otherwise known as "a string of planks bolted to rock far, far from terra firma."

In Martin Scorsese's 1976 classic "Taxi Driver," cabbie Travis Bickle mutters: "Twelve hours of work and I still can't sleep. Damn. Days go on and on. They don't end." Melissa Plout can relate. This New York City cab driver sports plenty of attitude, works grueling 12-hour shifts, and doesn't shy away from, ahem, colorful language. But that's where the similarity stops. Melissa is one of just 197 female cabbies in the Big Apple, and even after her long day behind the wheel, she still finds time to write up her daily trials and tribulations on this blog. Be forewarned -- her gritty accounts of life on the streets are not for the faint of heart. Melissa talks about everything from the dire traffic, her close calls with other vehicles, and the aggression that sometimes comes her way. In the end, it all makes up for a sometimes painful, but often fascinating, portrait of a real-life job in a real-life city.