Customer Reviews

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

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3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I really enjoyed reading this book. It is a true story of the rise & fall of George Jung. George became involved with smuggling pot in from Mexico in the 1960's & went on to become one of the founding members of the Colombian Cocaine Cartel led by Pablo Escobar. Geogre intially was Pablo's MAJOR U.S. cocaine distributor, was the one link Pablo had to the U.S. cocaine distribution network. Another Colombian, Carlos Ledher, stole George's U.S. connections, & cut him out of the business. George then basically married into a Colombian family, and started moving smaller cocaine contract loads through a relative by marriage-Humberto. Humberto was connected to Pablo Escobar.
This book is well written, and also tells a bit about drugs, their cultivation, the human physiology of drug interactions, and how basic smuggling operations are established. It is also just a plain good story. I thought the ending was a bit sad though.
To clear up the question of: "Is George free, or in Prison". George was free, and delivering seafood to restaurants in Massachusetts. He subsequently got busted smuggling pot from Mexico, and received a 22 year jail sentence in 1993-1994, and is currtely in prison at Otisville, New York.

I read this book after seeing the movie "Blow". The movie was average but the subject matter was something I wanted to explore after seeing George Jung's picture at the end. I was not disappointed. I couldn't put the book down and throughly enjoyed it.

As all biographies do, the initial setup of his formative years is somewhat boring and can be skimmed. Bad student, played football. Nothing else is relevant. But when the book overlays living in Los Angeles in the 60's with the drug trade, this book really heats up. Jung reminds me of Forrest Gump. Always in a place where drug history was happening. Particularly where his old grass connection is the key to establishing him as a major player in the new cocaine business.

The book and the movie have many similar points but many different ones. For example, in the movie, his first stewardess girlfriend dies. But in the book, there is no mention of when and how they split up. In the movie, he misses his daughter and wants contact. There is no mention of that in the book.

The book really projects that Jung ...got in the right business at the right time. But he's not really a smart guy. The movie covers some of his busts correctly but the Cape Cod bust that starts his downfall is almost unbelievable how stupid he could be. Read the book to find this bizarre fact.

As a earlier reviewer who identified himself as a former drug runner stated, using your own product clouds your judgement and clearly that applied to Jung. Irrespective, this book gives great insight into the drug traffic business and shows what a bizarre environment it was. Somewhat like the Wild West. Read this book for entertainment value as it reads quickly and is very informative.

Those interested in learning about the disparate personalities largely responsible for the cocaine avalanche that washed over America need only read this excellent book and Mark Bowden's equally fascinating work of non-fiction titled "Killing Pablo."

In "Blow", we laugh at the ordeals of George Jung and company as they grow rich exploiting America's burgeoning drug market while being chased, indicted, and jailed by inept and unsophisticated law enforcement agencies and prosecutors. In "Killing Pablo", we shudder over the actions of the world's (formerly) most ruthless drug lord who held Colombia hostage through rewards and ruthless punishment aptly termed "plata o plomo" (silver or lead).

Porter and Bowden performed exhaustive research on their respective protagonists and produced rousing narratives. Two of the finest works of non-fiction - of any topic - I've ever read.

Aware that the movie is only loosely based on a true story, I turned to this book for a more factual account of the rise and fall of George Jung. But Jung's own account of the execution he witnessed on the Escobar ranch, to pick an example, differs as much from the one in this book as from the movie!

By page four I knew this wasn't secretly penned by Truman Capote. It is vulgar and loaded with malapropisms, for example: the word "obviate" is repeatedly used where "eliminate" is intended. Evidently no one at Harper Collins knows what the word means. "Secrete" is used for "secret." There are stretches long enough that I was able to get into the read before pausing to wonder what was meant by a non sequitur or a sentence that is not a sentence, but a slight effort by a copy editor or high school English teacher would have greatly improved the work. The editors and "fact checker" should all be serving time for criminal negligence. Terrible job.

Carlos Lehder is portrayed as a reckless megalomaniac brazen enough to unabashedly ramp up his smuggling through Norman's Cay to full tilt --really taking it to another level-- seemingly without regard for how much attention it would draw; indiscretion ultimately did the cartel in. There are interesting tales of boaters being chased away from the island, including a retired Walter Cronkite! Once a boat was found adrift in that vicinity, spattered with blood.

Surprisingly, considering the vast differences between this book and the movie, the fight scene with Mirtha driving up the I-95 one night actually did occur.

Regarding the Eastham bust, George was said to be looking at a ten-year sentence for the coke, but the book makes no mention whatsoever as to whether Richard Barile did in fact have the machine gun he mentioned at least twice to the undercover cop that evening, possession of which would carry the same sentence under federal law --not to mention what the state of Massachusetts would have done to him. There are many such places throughout the book that left me wondering why something was covered so unevenly and then just abandoned. At another point it refers in passing to George having two children, with no mention before or after of a second child being born.

Some of the "factoids" regarding aviation and firearms are hilariously inaccurate. A Hughes 500 helicopter becomes a "Huey 500." ("Huey" refers to an entirely different type of helicopter, and there's no such thing as a "Huey 500.") And once and for all, folks, a .357 magnum will not go through an engine block; that's a myth. (It just ricochets, leaving a tiny dent on the surface. Don't try this at home.)

For an enthralling account of indulgence, lust, and greed in the 1970's narcotics biz try "Underground Empire" by James Mills. It covers selected DEA CENTAC operations on different continents. Think you can't finish a thousand-page book? You wait. :-) Also, another bio of George Jung is currently in the works. And for instant gratification search the web for "Norman's Cay."

I was handed Blow from a friend and finished it within a busy schedule in less than a nine days. It is the unbelievable story of George Jung's life from being a small town local hero, to becoming deeply seeded in the Colombian drug trade. He managed to make more than 100 million dollars before he was caught for the last time and his extraordinary life leaves you nothing but dumbfounded.

My favorite aspect of this novel is that you fall in love with and root for the bad-guy. The reader never really acknowledges George as the enemy even though he is part of a murderous, criminal trade. Because his personality is so likeable you disregard many of the immoral things that he does. How he plays the prison game and makes friends everywhere he goes. George even manages to befriend Senor Pablo Escobar. As a white kid from suburbia this feat is astonishing.

The story is written through a mix of George's and author Bruce Porter's point of view and with interviews from several of his close friends and colleagues you can understand his life and actions from every point of view. George's dialogue is especially captivating because he is such a humble, carefree man with it seems no fear and complete control.

Since the book is vulgar and sometimes portrays cocaine use in a humorous and unapologetic fashion I would recommend the book for at least, mature late teens. This book instantly became a new favorite of mine and because it is a true story I think it is especially unbelievable. This intensely researched and complete chronicle of George Jung's life is one of the most irresistible stories I have ever read.

While it may be difficult to empathize with the downfall of one of the biggest drug cartels in history, the story of George Jung will certainly amaze, capture and hold your attention from start to finish. Anyone who grew up in the sixties, an era of "flower children, hippies,love-ins, sit-ins," Vietnam protests and communal living, will recall the introduction into our society of "pot" and LSD. George Jung became one of the largest importers of marijuana, which eventually led to his connection with Carlos Lehder and the Meddellin Cocaine Cartel.

From opulant living, a home literally lined with money, fast women, fast cars and fast-paced lifestyle to the downward spiral of drugs, paranoia, health problems and arrest, this is the actual account of George Jung's life. This is the amazing journey of a man who had it all, to a defeated man who lost everything in the process. It is an inside look at life in the fast lane from the glorious moments in the sun to absolute terror, corruption and destruction. Now a major motion picture, you will not want to miss either the book or the movie - both are excellent.

For anyone expecting this book to be a kind of light, or detailing of the events in the film it's not. The George Jung we read about in Bruce Porter's book is a quite different one from the one played by Johnny Depp. He's a lot smarter (while not exactly being a genius), a lot more greedy, and a lot tougher. Plus, anyone enamored of the movie will be starstruck by the level of embellishment Ted Demme indulged in while making it. Jung never stopped dealing, even after he basically got a "get out of jail free" card for testifying against Carlos Lehder (Diego in the movie), a sinister megalomaniac who along with Jung basically introduced coke to the US. There was no "one last run" for his daughter, who we only hear about a few times in the book in vague reveries of regret Jung has for all she had to witness in his "glory days". Mirtha was not quite the ruthless bitch Penelope Cruz played, and seemed to have stuck by Jung through quite a bit. The book is essentially a repetitive documentation of drug smuggle after drug smuggle, until Jung gets way too comfortable and dipping into his own stash all the time. He just doesn't know when to calm down. Soon, he's so fried that he starts bragging to undercover cops and taking them under his wing as fellow smugglers, and so of course getting busted.

For all this, Jung is no ruthless monster like many of the people we see him associate with. He's actually kind of a middle class goofball who had a business mind and weird determination to never be poor, which may have stemmed from his childhood (who cares? that's no excuse.) He seems to have had quite a bit of intellect and could have been successful at something other than his purely destructive occupation. He simply chose his own path and paid for it. He gets out of jail after he should have gone away forever, starts dealing weed again, and then goes away for good. There's no heartbreaking twist to any of this, just one man's greed getting the best of him. This is a sad story not for Jung but for his daughter, his wife, and his father, who also seems to have seen some good in him the whole way through. (We actually get to read the real tape Jung made for his father, one of the highlights of the book). An alternately exciting, depressing tale.

George Jung is widely acknowedged as the man who introduced cocaine for mass consumption to people in the United States, and this book tells us how he did it. Sort of a lesson in how to smuggle.

From his begginings as a high school football player, through his early days selling marijuana in Florida, right through to his career as the number one cocaine supplier in the US and ending up with him languishing in prison, every aspect of his life is covered here in all it's glory.

With a life as rich in detail as Jung's, the book could easily have become bogged down in detail, but it's to the writers credit that he never lets the pace flag.

Highly reccommended.

Being a small-town gal from Mid-Mo, I had no IDEA about anything about the drug trade. This book will open your eyes and get you inside the head of the most successful cocaine smuggler in US history.
Here is my review of the book as it appeared in my high school newspaper:
If people were ever interested in smuggling cocaine into the United States in the 1970's and 80's, they only had to come to one person - a man named George Jung.
The novel "Blow" recounts Jung's rise and desperate fall in the Medellin cocaine cartel, an association of high price manufacturers of the illegal product, where he played a key role alongside the infamous Pablo Escobar.
Writing in chronological order of Jung's adventures and the exotic locales he visits, author Bruce Porter uses his exclusive eyewitness sources to tell the fascinating life story of a successful drug smuggler.
The book's success lies in the exceptional amount of detail present. The intricately woven web of facts mesmerizes the reader as the story unfolds. Porter leaves nothing of this amazing story untold, which makes the story complete; the reader does not feel cheated out of information.
"Blow" is also successful regarding the intimate interviews given by Jung; his wife, Mirtha; and his may associates in his million dollar drug operation. Porter chooses the right times to let the people involved tell the story. Tucked in with the rest of the story are quotes and anecdotes from Jung's closest friends and businessman. Kudos to Porter for getting the interviewees to reveal so much about their lives.
The only downside present is that with so many characters involved, the reader might forget who some people are and what thier part in the novel is.
Although changed and dramatized for effect, the movie is an accurate representation of the novel.
"Blow" is an enjoyable and intriguing true crime classic.

Ever wonder what would be your life if they made it a movie?
Awesome book! Well-written for a pop bio.

I fell asleep reading it, dreamt about about the Medellin cartel, picked it up again before getting out of bed.

This, the real story, was messier than the movie. The essence was the same, but the order was different. Details were moved around. George had a sister. His girlfriend didn't die of cancer. He didn't quit after breaking with Carlos.

That was interesting to me, but I found this story just amazing. . . and well put-together. Good work Porter.