Blow, Bruce Porter
Blow, Bruce Porter
29 Rating(s)
List: $22.95 | Sale: $16.07
Club: $11.47

Blow
How a Small-Town Boy Made $100 Million with the Medellín Cocaine Cartel and Lost It All

Author: Bruce Porter

Narrator: Stephen Bowlby

Unabridged: 13 hr 44 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 10/10/2017

Synopsis

Blow is the unlikely story of George Jung’s roller-coaster ride from middle-class high school football hero to the heart of Pablo Escobar’s Medellín 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 a new 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 supercharged 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.

About Bruce Porter

Bruce Porter is a former writer for Newsweek and a professor at the Columbia Journalism School. He has written for the Washington Post, New York Times Magazine, Playboy, and Rolling Stone, as well as dozens of other magazines and newspapers. Porter’s first book, Blow, was a bestselling New York Times Notable Book and was made into a major motion picture. He lives in New York City.

About Stephen Bowlby

Stephen Bowlby is an experienced audiobook narrator. He earned his BA in speech & theater at Westminster College in Pennsylvania, a short trip from his native North Jersey. His career quickly moved from commercial radio into television and film production as a writer, an editor, and a director with voice work ever present.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Stefanie on March 02, 2022

This is the story of George Jung, a United States citizen who became involved in the drug cartel of Pablo Escobar. He got his start with marijuana before linking up with others in the cocaine business. I have seen this movie a thousand times, but I somehow never realized this was a true story or tha......more

Goodreads review by Conrad on September 14, 2018

Went into more detail than the movie - rhe stories and adventures they get up to are more extreme. Good read!......more

Goodreads review by Lindsey on January 17, 2011

This is a really fascinating story, and proves the old cliche that the truth is often stranger (and I would add, more interesting) than fiction. I picked this up on a whim having had it on my shelf for years. I got it for free after a reissue, I guess. I'd already seen the movie, but it's definitely......more

Goodreads review by Rowland on July 27, 2010

Some books give you a glimpse of a world that is happening right around you but you’re not really aware of. This book, as the name suggests, is a factual account of George------, a dope smuggler. George started with weed, flying it up from Mexico in the 60’s and eventually became an integral part of......more

Goodreads review by John David Bull on March 24, 2022

The movie is great but this book reveals a whole lot more of what actually happened in Boston Georges life.......more

Quotes

“Extraordinarily interesting…Mr. Porter has done an excellent job telling the tale of a very unusual entrepreneur.” New York Times Book Review

“The story belongs to anyone who has ever savored a well-told tale of adventure, greed, deceit, and revenge. Best of all, it’s true.” Houston Chronicle

“With drama and detail…Porter reconstructs the fast, amoral life of George Jung…whose adventures with stacks of cash, kinky sex, and dangerous deals hold voyeuristic fascination.” Publishers Weekly

“A sleigh-ride-to-hell story of how ‘60s hippie innocence turned into ‘80s megadepravity…finely researched, told with pizzazz.” Kirkus Reviews

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