Snowblind: A Brief Career in the Cocaine Trade

I find this story facinating. I read it as a library book years ago and couldn't find that it was still available in my current library system, so I ordered it here.

After seeing the movie Blow and reading the related book, I enjoyed the subject so much I bought this book. I was disappointed. First, this is a very old book written in the 70's. Almost an amatuerish attempt. This book describes the drug smuggler, how he gets in the business, how he imports and makes his connections, and how he eventually is caught. Unfortunately, the author didn't know how to edit the book and instead starts on a story and then decides to give you an education on everything he has read about the subject. Then he goes back to the story. Therefore, I found this book to be verrrrry slow.On the positive side, it's almost comical how this guy falls in the business and decides to go to Columbia to set up his product. Not really knowing anyone, he just meets street people and eventually runs into connections. The smuggler's real talent is concocting the scam on bringing the product in. Most of his shipments are not stopped, but even if they were, he develops stories so his mules can act like they had no knowledge and won't be charged. You should be aware, this is really not a big-time smuggler on the scale of the Blow character, but rather this smuggler brings in enough to last him a few months, then goes back for another trip.If you're interested in drug smuggling, this book may fill in the holes. But from a pleasurable fascinating pleasurable read, there are better books like "Blow".

8th copy I've had. Nobody wants to return them.

I thought this book was a really neat read. The story tells one mans journey through the cocaine trade. The story catches you from a two angles. First the look into world of drug smuggling and smugglers and second the charaters in the story and how their lives are chnaged and different because of their connection with the drug world

Enjoyable, originally read it in 1976, lost the book, bought a replacement.

Excellent book, had the paperback and wanted a hard cover 1st edition.

I enjoyed this book, but it was a slow read. I thought it was interesting how Swan smuggled in the 70's, but I'm sure none of these techniques would work today--if for no other reason, the cocaine-sniffing dogs! The author writes very well, but he was so sharp and witty, that I'm afraid a lot of those witticms flew right over my head, and I had to re-read many times to figure out what was meant, and even then, sometimes couldn't.

I feel that in the first chapter or so, the author makes comparisons and uses terms that were a bit confusing and hard to follow at times. It almost turned me off from wanting to continue reading the book, but after you get past that, the book is an interesting read. It gives you a little chemistry lesson along with some history lessons. All-in-all, I would say the book was decent. It's not something I would just pick up as something that peeks my interest but it was decent nonetheless.