narcotics Archives

May 13, 2023 wezg

Review: Adventure Everywhere – Pablo Picasso’s Paris Nightlife – by Dave Haslam

I like the art of Picasso, I like the city of Paris, and I like the books of Dave Haslam. I was therefore pleased to hear of the release of this book which studies the life and art of famous

April 4, 2023 wezg

Review: Forty Nights – by Chris Thrall

I read ‘Eating Smoke’ some time ago, Chris’ autobiographic story of descent into Crystal Meth psychosis while working for the Triads in Hong Kong. It was a great story and I loved that book. I noticed that Chris was appearing

March 19, 2023 wezg

Review: Spare – by Prince Harry

If you were a hermit living in a remote cave then I expect that even you would be well aware that Prince Harry and his wife have been in the news recently quite a lot. Initially I decided I was

January 17, 2023 wezg

Review: Class of 88 – Find the Warehouse. Lose the Hitmen. Pump the Beats – by Wayne Anthony

This book is about a promoter’s journey in the beginnings of the Acid House music scene that took over Great Britain back in the late 1980s, cementing a new popular culture that would grip the masses of rebellious youth at

December 8, 2022 wezg

Review: Life After Dark – A History of British Nightclubs & Music Venues – by Dave Haslam

I got excited when this book arrived on my doorstep. At first glance it has all the key ingredients for a great book. Hacienda DJ author, history of British nightclubs – I expected lots of gory detail and exciting anecdotes

December 3, 2022 wezg

Review: In The Shadow of Papillon – Seven Years of Hell in Venezuela’s Prison System – by Frank Kane with John Tilsley

Frank Kane and his girlfriend, Sam, after their business was failing in the U.K. made the fateful decision to become cocaine drug couriers in Venezuela. Whilst attempting to fly out from the airport on Caribbean Island, Isla de Margarita, the

December 3, 2022 wezg

Review: In The Shadow of Papillon – Seven Years of Hell in Venezuela’s Prison System – by Frank Kane with John Tilsley

October 14, 2022 wezg

Review: A Great Perhaps? Colombia: Conflict and Convergence – by Dickie Davis, David Kilcullen, Greg Mills and David Spencer

David Kilcullen has had a few books included on my shelf recently. As a military expert on Guerrilla Warfare, I was thrilled to find this new book on the Colombian Civil War which he coauthors with a group of specialists

October 6, 2022 wezg

Review: Gommorah – Italy’s Other Mafia – by Roberto Saviano

Roberto Saviano is the Italian Salman Rushdie. After writing his exposé on the Neapolitan mafia that is the subject of this book, Gomorrah, Saviano had serious death threats from organised crime and had to go into hiding and lives under

September 1, 2022 wezg

Review: The Divine Spark – Psychedelics, Consciousness and the Birth of Civilisation – by Graham Hancock

This book, edited by one of my literary heroes, Graham Hancock, is a collection of stories focussed mainly on the expansion of consciousness by the use of psychedelics, especially the Amazonian, ‘Vine of the Soul’, Ayahuasca. The authors range from

September 1, 2022 wezg

Review: Poverty Safari – Understanding the Anger of Britain’s Underclass – by Darren McGarvey

Poverty Safari is a winner of the Orwell Prize in 2018. The author, Darren McGarvey offers us a biographical account of his life in working class Glasgow suburb Pollok. Darren is a rapper who does extensive community work and is

July 31, 2022 wezg

Review: Blood, Gun, Money – How America Arms Gangs and Cartels – by Ioan Grillo

This is the third Grillo installment that I have tackled and Ioan is an author who is a gritty investigative journalist who tends to put himself into quite dangerous situations in order to explore very controversial and often violent global

March 15, 2021 wezg

Review: Prison Writing of Latin America by Joey Whitfield

Joey is a teacher of mine at MLANG in Cardiff University. This is his first book. It explores prison writing in Latin America and looks at abolitionism of the penal system and draws on some really rather delicate themes that

October 27, 2019 wezg

Review: Happy Mondays – Excess All Areas – by Simon Spence

This is the third Simon Spence book that I have read. He is a very talented music journalist from Manchester with a taste for documenting, wild, stylish cultural movements that have emerged from the Madchester craziness. Excess All Areas covers

October 25, 2019 wezg

Review: Altered State – The Story of Ecstasy Culture and Acid House – by Matthew Collin

I’ve already read a Matthew Collin book – This is Serbia Calling – so I was chuffed when I stumbled upon this work, a history of UK dance music culture. As a DJ and Promoter for 24 years I’m quite

December 27, 2018 wezg

Review: Dangerous People, Dangerous Places – by Norman Parker

Author, Norman Parker served a 24 year jail sentence for murder. On his release, wanting to experience life to the fullest, he took advantage of his writing skills to become a journalist for lads mags and the Daily Express and

December 20, 2018 wezg

Review: Gypsy Jane – by Jane Lee with David Jarvis

I read this book really quickly- it was enticing and a good tale. Gypsy Jane is something of a crazy phenomenon who rocked the London underworld with some pretty brutal firsthand tales. It didn’t take much for the Gran to

December 16, 2018 wezg

Review: Chasing the Scream – The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs – by Johann Hari

This is a solid well written piece of investigative journalism, exploring the history and present situation and indeed future of the War on Drugs. Hari traces back the war to a zealous prohibition agent, Harry Anslinger, who carved out world

November 26, 2018 wezg

Review: El Sicario – Confessions of a Cartel Hit Man – by Molly Molloy and Charles Bowden

This is an explosive book, real revelations from a sicario or hitman for the Juarez cartel in Mexico. In the murky world of narcotics enforcers are employed by the cartels to assassinate and extort owed money from victims. This sicario

November 20, 2018 wezg

Review: Escobar: The Inside Story of Pablo Escobar, the World’s Most Powerful Criminal. as Told by His Brother Roberto Escobar

Much has been said about Pablo Escobar, who was the richest criminal in history and the head of the Medellin cartel in Colombia. This book is written from the heart and is an intimate portrait of the great man as

November 15, 2018 wezg

Review: Drug Lords – The Rise and Fall of the Cali Cartel – by Ron Chepesiuk

If the Pablo Escobar’s Medellin Cartel can be regarded as the Henry Fords of the Drugs business then the Cali cartel with its corporate business acumen can certainly be regarded as the McDonalds. This well-written, detailed biography tracks the rise

November 3, 2018 wezg

Review: Gangster Warlords – Drug Dollars, Killing Fields and the New Politics of Latin America – by Ioan Grillo

This is the second of Ioan Grillo’s books that I have read and I found this volume equally as good as my first encounter with this talented British journalist. Gangster Warlords focuses on 4 separate crime gangs across the Americas.

November 3, 2018 wezg

Review: Gangster Warlords – Drug Dollars, Killing Fields and the New Politics of Latin America – by Ioan Grillo

October 16, 2018 wezg

Review: Silver Bullets – by Élmer Mendoza

This Mexican author, Elmer Mendoza, is about as vibrant a writer of fiction that I have encountered since Hemingway. A truly unique flowing style that is amazing to digest. The hero of the book is policeman Edgar ‘Lefty’ Mendieta. He

October 12, 2018 wezg

Review: The Cartel – The Inside Story of Britain’s Biggest Drugs Gang – by Graham Johnson

When you see the title ‘The Cartel’ you might immediately imagine a book about Colombian or Mexican drug lords. Yet, this book covers a 30 year history of a homegrown cartel, based in Liverpool. Back in the 1970s a pioneering

February 1, 2018 wezg

Review: El Infierno – Drugs, Gangs, Riots and Murder – My Time Inside Ecuador’s Toughest Prisons – by Pieter Tritton

This autobiographical account of Brit drug smuggler, Pieter Tritton, is a flowing, page-turning journey that documents his twelve years locked up in Ecuador’s notorious, corrupt and highly dangerous prison system. Tritton is already in trouble back in the UK where

January 23, 2018 wezg

Review: Narrating Narcos: Culiacán and Medellín – by Gabriela Polit Dueñas

The author is exploring the impact of local culture on the artistic output of Narcoculture in the form of literature and art in two specific par excellence Narco cities in Latin America. We are introduced to the Culichis of Culiacán

February 28, 2017 wezg

Review: At The Devil’s Table – Inside the Fall of the Cali Cartel – the World’s Biggest Crime Syndicate – by William C. Rempel

Jorge Salcedo signed up to the Cali cartel in order to lead a mission to assassinate Pablo Escobar, head of the rival Medellín cartel and, in Jorge’s eyes, a clear and present danger to the people of Colombia. This ex

February 12, 2017 wezg

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