The Last Narco: Updated and Revised - by Malcolm Beith (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

A new and updated edition of Malcolm Beith's thrilling inside-account of Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman's notorious Sinaloa drug cartel.

"Malcolm Beith risked life and limb to tell the inside story of Joaquín 'El Chapo' Guzmán Loera, Mexico's notorious drug capo." --George W. Grayson, author of Mexico: Narco-Violence and a Failed State?

Until 2016, the dense hills of Sinaloa, Mexico, were home to the most powerful drug lord since Pablo Escobar: Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman. Guzman was among the word's ten most wanted men and appeared on Forbes magazine's billionaire list. With his massive wealth, his army of professional killers, and a network of informants that reached into the highest levels of government, catching Guzman was considered impossible - until it wasn't.

Newsweek correspondent Malcolm Beith has spent years reporting on the drug wars and followed the chase with full access to senior officials and exclusive interviews with soldiers and drug traffickers in the region, including members of Guzman's cartel.

Newly updated with Beith's gripping account of the trial that put Guzman away for life, The Last Narco is essential reading about one of the most dramatic news stories of our day - a true-crime thriller happening in real-time.

"The Last Narco gracefully captures the heroic struggle of those who dare to stand up to the cartels, and the ways those cartels have tragically corrupted every aspect of Mexican law enforcement." --Laura Bickford, producer, Traffic

Review Quotes

Praise for The Last Narco:

"Malcolm Beith gives clarity and light to an area almost impossible to decode."--Eduardo Medina-Mora, former Attorney General of Mexico

"Brave and honest ... as reliable a guide as you are likely to get to the cross-currents of the drug war." --Economist

"Courageous, gritty, and gripping."--Publishers Weekly

"A deeply sourced, widely-reported and profoundly, disturbing saga of an entire nation at war with itself."--Nicholas Shou, journalist and author of Kill the Messenger

"A startling account of a desperate problem boiling on and spilling over the border."--Kirkus Reviews

"All of Mexico is El Chapo country. His rise parallels that of Pablo Escobar." --Newsweek

"Malcolm Beith's book is a virtual nonstop chase." --Albuquerque Journal

"The Last Narco is a brave and terrific headlong journalistic trek into the dangerous, and immensely relevant, terrain of drug trafficking in Mexico, and the life and times of its foremost practitioner." --Sam Quinones, author of True Tales from Another Mexico

"The Last Narco gracefully captures the heroic struggle of those who dare to stand up to the cartels, and the ways those cartels have tragically corrupted every aspect of Mexican law enforcement." --Laura Bickford, producer, Traffic

"Malcolm Beith slaps our faces with our ignorance. We barely know Mexico, and understand even less of its major industry, drugs. In The Last Narco, he gives us a look into a place our government either denies or lies about. This time you can run, but you can't hide." --Charles Bowden, author of Murder City

"No 'war on terror' was ever as terrifying as the ferocious wars of the drug lords in Mexico. In The Last Narco, Malcolm Beith courageously takes us to the front lines in the heart of the Mexican badlands--and also right on the border of the United States. This is a threat to homeland security that is too often ignored by the press and public, and this is the book that brings it all into focus. A must read." --Christopher Dickey, author of Securing the City: Inside America's Best Counterterror Force--the NYPD

"Malcolm Beith risked life and limb to tell the inside story of Joaquín 'El Chapo' Guzmán Loera, Mexico's notorious drug capo. A novelist could not have presented a more intriguing or compelling tale of corruption, intimidation, murder, blood feuds, life-and-death negotiations, and the entrepreneurial skill of a near-mythic figure whom Forbes Magazine named one of the world's richest men. Beith's superb book corroborates the cliché that fact is stranger than fiction." --George W. Grayson, professor of government at the College of William & Mary and the author of Mexico: Narco-Violence and a Failed State?

"He is the last of the Mohicans. All of the other big cartels have been decapitated. That is why they want him so badly." --Jorge Chabat, Mexico City Law Enforcement Expert

"A virtual nonstop chase." --Trading Markets

About the Author

Malcolm Beith is a writer based in Mexico City. He has covered the drug war for Newsweek, and has contributed to Foreign Policy, World Politics Review and Jane's Intelligence Weekly. He has also reported from Iraq, Haiti, and Colombia.