BLOW: How a Small-Town Boy Made $100 Million with the Medellín Cocaine Cartel and Lost It All (edition 2015)

by Bruce Porter (Author)

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253	4	105,957	(3.42)	1
BLOW is the unlikely story of George Jung's roller coaster ride from middle-class high school football hero to the heart of Pable Escobar's Medellin cartel-- the largest importer of the United States cocaine supply in the 1980s. Jung's early business of flying marijuana into the United States from the mountains of Mexico took a dramatic turn when he met Carlos Lehder, a young Colombian car thief with connections to the then newly born cocaine operation in his native land. Together they created anew model for selling cocaine, turning a drug used primarily by the entertainment elite into a massive and unimaginably lucrative enterprise-- one whose earnings, if legal, would have ranked the cocaine business as the sixth largest private enterprise in the Fortune 500. The ride came to a screeching halt when DEA agents and Florida police busted Jung with three hundred kilos of coke, effectively unraveling his fortune. But George wasn't about to go down alone. He planned to bring down with him one of the biggest cartel figures ever caught. With a riveting insider account of the lurid world of international drug smuggling and a super-charged drama of one man's meteoric rise and desperate fall, Bruce Porter chronicles Jung's life using unprecedented eyewitness sources in this critically acclaimed true crime classic.… (more)

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Member:	LatifHakiGabaHouse
Title:	BLOW: How a Small-Town Boy Made $100 Million with the Medellín Cocaine Cartel and Lost It All
Authors:	Bruce Porter (Author)
Info:	St. Martin's Griffin (2015), Edition: New edition, 352 pages
Collections:	Your library
Rating:
Tags:	true crime

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Blow: How a Small-Town Boy Made $100 Million with the Medellin Cocaine Cartel and Lost It All by Bruce Porter

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This is one of the better books about the drug trade that I have read. The level of detail that Porter provides about the smuggling operations is excellent. He devotes a good portion of the book to discussion of this and that's the main reason why this book is so interesting. On the other hand, George Jung's story is a typical story of the drug dealer who doesn't know when to stop. I did think that discussing Jung's childhood did not really help the book in any way. It simply gave us background that really was not required to understand the rest of his life. Porter might have been better served by focusing less on Jung and more on the smuggling. Overall, however, I would recommend this book. (

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reenum | Nov 1, 2020 |

After watching the film of the same name in which Johnny Depp depicts drug smuggler George Jung, I found myself wondering if I too should put together a high-scale cocaine smuggling operation. After all, it seemed like fun. All those parties, traveling to exotic locations, marrying Penelope Cruz. What is there not to like about it?! Okay, there is the small case of incarceration in one of America’s most notorious prisons, so before I jump at setting myself up with some unsavory Colombian friends, maybe I should explore this little venture in a bit more detail.

And that has how I found myself reading Bruce Porter’s account of How a Small-Town Boy Made $100 Million with the Medellin Cocaine Cartel and Lost It All and here is a quick spoiler – I won’t be following up on any of those dreams of starting up my own magic Charlie (minus the chocolate) Factory.

To read the rest of this review please click here:
http://stevenscaffardi.blogspot.co.uk/2011/04/blow-by-bruce-porter-book-review.h... (

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StevenScaffardi | Jul 21, 2013 |

There was a movie based on this book, which was written about the life of a marijuana and cocaine smuggler. George Jung married into what was eventually known as the Medellìn Cartel, made hundreds of millions of dollars, and supposedly lost it all.The book provides a lot of interesting information and accounts of drug production, smuggling, and dealing since the 1960s. It occasionally attempts to romaticize the lifestyle of George Jung, but the realities of his life–addiction, a daughter he hardly knows, parents who disowned him, and many years behind bars–are more sad than attractive. Entertaining, but not impressive (

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csmirl | May 1, 2011 |

Saw the film....4 stars just for Depp (superficial I know, but hey!). Should read the book. (

)

velvetink | Mar 31, 2013 |

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Blow [2001 film] by Ted Demme

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BLOW is the unlikely story of George Jung's roller coaster ride from middle-class high school football hero to the heart of Pable Escobar's Medellin cartel-- the largest importer of the United States cocaine supply in the 1980s. Jung's early business of flying marijuana into the United States from the mountains of Mexico took a dramatic turn when he met Carlos Lehder, a young Colombian car thief with connections to the then newly born cocaine operation in his native land. Together they created anew model for selling cocaine, turning a drug used primarily by the entertainment elite into a massive and unimaginably lucrative enterprise-- one whose earnings, if legal, would have ranked the cocaine business as the sixth largest private enterprise in the Fortune 500. The ride came to a screeching halt when DEA agents and Florida police busted Jung with three hundred kilos of coke, effectively unraveling his fortune. But George wasn't about to go down alone. He planned to bring down with him one of the biggest cartel figures ever caught. With a riveting insider account of the lurid world of international drug smuggling and a super-charged drama of one man's meteoric rise and desperate fall, Bruce Porter chronicles Jung's life using unprecedented eyewitness sources in this critically acclaimed true crime classic.

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