'The best crime book since Wiseguy' - Rich Cohen
A real-life Scarface, Jon was born into the Gambino Mafia family and witnessed his first murder aged seven. He joined a US Army assassination squad in Vietnam to escape a teen criminal charge, then fled New York to reinvent himself in Miami as the number one supplier of cocaine in the US. With a crazed bodyguard always at his side, and a fortress protected by mortars, tear-gas cannons, and a gold-fanged attack dog, Roberts was brutally effective at what he did.
With a cast that includes everyone from Jimi Hendrix and OJ Simpson to the CIA and General Noriega, American Desperado is a hedonistic, adrenaline-soaked joyride through the world of Escobar and the cartels, told by one of most successful criminals of all time. An American criminal mastermind -- Ed Caesar * Sunday Times * A spellbinding narrative of drugs, death and debauchery as told by one of America's most notorious criminals... A savage, unrelenting tale * Kirkus Reviews * A tour de force. The best crime book since Wiseguy. Puts you in the middle of a world where it's wonderful to be a tourist, terrible to be a resident. I am filled with nothing but admiration and envy for Evan Wright -- Rich Cohen, author of THE FISH THAT ATE THE WHALE Imagine if Mister Kurtz from Heart of Darkness sat down with Dick Cavett for a little chat about the nature of good and evil, empathy, fatherhood, violence, drugs, power, self-knowledge, women, family, the hero versus the anti-hero, freedom, imprisonment...Try as you might, you can't really put this book down -- Doug Stanton, author of HORSE SOLDIERS and IN HARM'S WAY Seldom have I read an account of criminal enterprise that took me so deeply into the blackness of a man's soul - a scary read, pounding and relentless and irresistible -- Bruce Porter, author of BLOW
American Desperado: My life as a Cocaine Cowboy