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  The Cornbread Mafia - A...

  James Higdon

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  In the summer of 1987, Johnny Boone set out to grow andharvest one of the greatest outdoor marijuana crops in modern times. In doingso, he set into motion a series of events that defined him and his associatesas the largest homegrown marijuana syndicate in American history, also known asthe Cornbread Mafia.Author James Higdon-whose relationship with Johnny Boone,currently a federal fugitive, made him the first journalist subpoenaed underthe Obama administration-takes listeners back to the 1970s and '80s and theclash between federal and local law enforcement and a band of Kentucky farmerswith moonshine and pride in their bloodlines. By 1989 the task force assignedto take down men like Johnny Boone had arrested sixty-nine men and one woman frombusts on twenty-nine farms in ten states, and seized two hundred tons of pot.Of the seventy individuals arrested, zero talked. How it all went down is atale of Mafia-style storylines emanating from the Bluegrass State, andpopulated by Vietnam veterans and weed-loving characters caught up inTarantino-level violence and heart-breaking altruism.Accompanied by a backdrop of rock-and-roll andrhythm-and-blues, this work of dogged investigative journalism and history istold by Higdon in action-packed, colorful and riveting detail.

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  The Cocaine Diaries - A...

  Jeff Farrell, Paul Keany

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  ‘It won’t happen to me. That’s what I thought when I got on the plane to Venezuela. But it did – I got caught.’ 
  Caught smuggling half a million euros’ worth of cocaine, Paul Keany was sexually assaulted by Venezuelan anti-drugs officers before being sentenced to eight years in the notorious Los Teques prison outside Caracas. There he was plunged into a nightmarish world of coke-fuelled killings, gun battles, stabbings, extortion and forced hunger strikes until finally, just over two years into his sentence, he gained early parole and embarked on a daring escape from South America . . . 
  Aided by his extensive prison diaries, Keany reveals the true horror of life inside Los Teques: a shocking underworld behind bars where inmates pay protection money to stay alive, prostitutes do the rounds and vast amounts of cocaine are smuggled in for cell-block bosses to sell on to prisoners for huge profits. The Cocaine Diaries is a remarkable story, told by Keany with honesty, courage and even humour, despite knowing that every day behind bars might have been his last.

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  The Hot One - A Memoir of...

  Carolyn Murnick

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  A gripping memoir of friendship with a tragic twist - two childhood best friends diverge as young adults, one woman is brutally murdered and the other is determined to uncover the truth about her wild and seductive friend.
  
  As girls growing up in rural New Jersey in the late 1980s, Ashley and Carolyn had everything in common: two outsiders who loved spending afternoons exploring the woods. Only when the girls attended different high schools did they begin to grow apart. While Carolyn struggled to fit in, Ashley quickly became a hot girl: popular, extroverted, and sexually precocious.
  
  After high school, Carolyn entered college in New York City and Ashley ended up in Los Angeles, where she quit school to work as a stripper and an escort, dating actors and older men, and experimenting with drugs. The last time Ashley visited New York, Carolyn was shocked by how the two friends had grown apart. One year later, Ashley was stabbed to death at age twenty-two in her Hollywood home.
  
  The man who may have murdered Ashley - an alleged serial killer - now faces trial in Los Angeles. Carolyn Murnick traveled across the country to cover the case and learn more about her magnetic and tragic friend. Part coming-of-age story, part true-crime mystery, The Hot One is a behind-the-scenes look at the drama of a trial and the poignancy of searching for the truth about a friend's truly horrifying murder.
  An Author's Republic audio production.

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  Seattle Prohibition -...

  Brad Holden

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  Prohibition consumed Seattle, igniting a war that lasted nearly twenty years and played out in the streets, waterways, and even town hall. Roy Olmstead, formerly a Seattle police officer, became the King of the Seattle Bootleggers, and Johnny Schnarr, running liquor down from Canada, revolutionized the speedboat industry. Frank Gatt, a south Seattle restaurateur, started the state’s biggest moonshining operation. Skirting around the law, the Coast Guard and the zealous assistant director of the Seattle Prohibition Bureau, William Whitney, was no simple feat, but many rose to the challenge. Author Brad Holden tells the spectacular story of Seattle in the time of Prohibition.“When you live in Seattle long enough, at a certain point you need to sit down and read a history that ties together the half-heard stories about vice dens and crooked cops you’ve pieced together from locals at the bar. Brad Holden’s “Seattle Prohibition,” a slim but dense account of Seattle shortly before, during and after Prohibition, is an excellent place to start. This is a riveting drama of plainly told facts.” —The Stranger“In a rapidly evolving city with little sense of its past, Brad Holden is Seattle’s new, essential cultural historian. His book builds a better understanding of how we arrived at the present and does it with color, wit and artful storytelling.” —Thomas Kohnstamm, author of Lake City “Elements of this story may be familiar to those who know some regional history, but there are some fascinating tidbits, such as how the booze trade contributed to the city’s first radio station.” —The Tacoma News Tribune

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  Risking Life for Death - Lessons...

  Ryan Blumenthal

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  Every contact leaves a trace: a single strand of hair or a tiny droplet of blood can be the silent witness at a crime scene. 
  Locard’s Exchange Principle underpins all forensic science and holds that the perpetrator of a crime will bring something to the crime scene and leave with something from it. 
  Forensic experts use this principle daily to catch murderers and assailants. In Risking Life for Death, South African forensic pathologist Ryan Blumenthal offers a master class in this singular forensic technique based on real-life case studies. With more than twenty years’ experience in the field, Blumenthal explains how to look for clues and traces, and how what he does not find at autopsy is often more important than what he does find. In other words, the absence of evidence can sometimes be of greater value than the presence of evidence. 
  His account also highlights the dangers forensic pathologists are exposed to daily. As they try to unravel the puzzle of someone’s death, forensic pathologists often face life-threatening infections, toxic gases and the hazards associated with high-profile cases – in effect, risking their life to solve someone else’s death. 
  An understanding of Locard’s Exchange Principle can help you become a medical detective in your own life, can help you be a happier person and can even provide you with a better philosophy for growing older, Blumenthal argues.

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  Murder in Sin City - Death of a...

  Jeff German

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  The reckless heir to the Horseshoe Club fortune, fifty-five-year-old Vegas casino boss Ted Binionlived the high life constantly teetering on the edge—surrounding himself with guns, heroin, cash, babes and mobsters. But it was a beautiful ex-stripper and her new lover who gave him the final, fatal push over the side.  The gripping true story of the fall of a powerful man that culminated in the most publicized murder in Las Vegas history—an almost perfect crime undone by the unbelievable greed of its perpetrators—Jeff German's Murder in Sin City is a stunning account of human deterioration and depravity, a neon-tinged view of the poisonous rot that festers beneath the Vegas glitter.  Now a Lifetime original movie, Sex and Lies in Sin City.

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