Amexica: War Along the Borderline

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Macmillan + ORM, Oct 26, 2010 - History - 422 pages

The harrowing story of the extraordinary terror unfolding along the US-Mexico border as the narco-war escalates to a fever pitch.

"Vulliamy, with a mix of irony and pathos, writes like a latter-day Graham Greene. . . . Like all good travel writing, Amexica is vivid, colorful, and exotic, filled with stirring vignettes and larger-than-life characters." — The New York Times Book Review

"Extraordinary." — Vanity Fair

In 2009, Ed Vulliamy traveled two thousand miles along the frontier from the Pacific Coast to the Gulf of Mexico, and from Tijuana to Matamoros, a journey through kaleidoscopic landscape of corruption and all-out civil war. He describes in revelatory detail the dreaded narco gangs; the smuggling of people, weapons, and illegal drugs; and the interrelated economies of drugs and the ruthless, systematic murder of young women in Ciudad Juárez. Amexica takes us far beyond today's headlines. It is a street-level portrait, by turns horrific and sublime, of a place and people in a time of war as much as of the war itself, "an impressively rendered, nightmare-inducing account" ( Kirkus Reviews, Top 25 Books of 2010).

"An engrossing travelogue . . . a vivid, disturbing dispatch from a very wild frontier." — Publishers Weekly

"Vulliamy paints a terrifying and authoritative portrait of violence." — The Wall Street Journal

"An absorbing odyssey . . . Vulliamy's reporting is faultlessly brave. . . . The scenery and characters he meets are brought alive with vividness and intensity." — The Telegraph (London)

 

Contents

INTRODUCTION AMEXICA
1
1 LA PLAZA
17
2 AQUÍ EMPIEZA LA PATRIA HERE BEGINS THE HOMELAND
42
3 EL CAMINO DEL DIABLO THE DEVILS HIGHWAY
66
INTERMISSION THE BUSINESS END OF A 12GAUGEBARRETT AND MORGANS WAR
107
4 URBAN FRANKENSTEIN
118
5 THE HUMAN JUNKYARD
164
6 THE WIND OF KNIVES
184
8 GATEWAY TO THE AMERICASPAX MAFIOSA
248
9 IRON RIVERTELL THEM WHO YOU ARE
281
EPILOGUE EL SOL NEGRO THE BLACK SUN
341
AFTERWORD TO THE 2011 EDITION BLOOD MONEY
345
NOTES
365
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE
377
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
383
INDEX
387

INTERMISSION THE ROAD IT GIVES AND THE ROAD IT TAKES AWAY
206
7 EAT OFF THE FLOOR
224

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About the author (2010)

ED VULLIAMY was the New York correspondent for The Observer from 1997 to 2003 and spent many years as an international correspondent for The Guardian. The author of Seasons in Hell, Vulliamy lives in London and Arizona.

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