THE LAST KILO

Raucous, sprawling account of Los Muchachos, the group credited with perfecting cocaine importation.

English, a journalist and bestselling author, looks to offer an accurate take on what is an oft-exaggerated underground history, noting, “My goal with this book has been to provide an account primarily from those who did not cooperate with the government.” He capably manages a complicated tale that ranges across numerous countries and a rogue’s gallery of cops and smugglers, some notorious like Pablo Escobar, others restrained and innovative. English writes, “The Narcosphere is not a physical place; it is a realm of operation, and a state of mind. It spans sovereign boundaries, physical space, borders, and political jurisdictions.” Based primarily on interviews with charismatic gang founder Willy Falcon, who recently finished a 27-year sentence, his epic narrative suggests that the refugees who fled Cuba for Florida following the Communist revolution proved crucial in the explosion of cocaine trafficking. At first, Falcon and his neighborhood friends were covertly encouraged as a means of raising money for anti-Castro efforts, but “what had started as an effort to assist those who hoped to kill the bearded dictator and liberate Cuba was about to become the white powder avalanche that changed America.” Falcon’s circle created a rationalized system for transporting large loads of cocaine, by cultivating close personal relationships with cartels in Colombia and, later, Mexico. They relied on numerous innovations, including short-wave radio communication and building airstrips on ranches in rural Florida, and lived as fugitives for several years when in 1987 the DEA eventually pursued indictments. English captures vividly the sleazy ambiance of the traffickers’ glory years and law enforcement’s efforts to comprehend an enterprise that, English argues, transformed Miami as a city, once narcos “began funneling money into Miami real estate.”

Engrossing true crime, with a rueful undertone of how perniciously the drug war affected the United States.