Killing Pablo

The drugs, the sex, the excess, the violence--this is the true story of Pablo Escobar, the most successful drug-dealer in history. Award-winning journalist and author of Black Hawk Down, Mark Bowden exposes, with unflinching accuracy, the legendary Medell’n drug-trafficking cartel. Starting from humble beginnings in a Medell’n suburb, Pablo Escobar muscles his way through the mean streets. From small-time car thief and local hoodlum, he soon rises to fame as a ruthless gangster. Already owning whole marijuana growth and distribution enterprises in the early 1970s, Escobar forges ahead to develop an unimaginably lucrative cocaine empire. By the early 1980s, Pablo is a multibillionaire, owning every extravagance money can buy, and wielding the power to unofficially select Colombian presidents. Killing Pablo concludes with lurid details of the unbelievable 16-month manhunt for Escobar that ended with his execution. Pete Bradbury narrates this account of a criminal mastermind who was also an admired Colombian folk hero.