Kilo

Book excerpt: Join the deadly journey of cocaine, from farmer to kingpin. Meet Maria. Maria doesn't see herself as a criminal. She's just a farmhand picking the crops that never lose money- coca. This is Cachote. He prays to the Virgin of the Assassins that his bullets find their target. If he misses, he'll have to answer to the cartel who pay him to take out their enemies. Pedro works the coca labs. But this laboratory is hidden deep in the jungle, and he turns coca leaves in to coca paste, a step just short of cocaine. And finally, here is Alex. Alex is a drug-lord and decides where the drug goes next- into Europe or the US. And he wields the power of life and death over everyone around him. In Kilo, Toby Muse takes us deeper into the drug trade than ever before, following a kilo of cocaine as it travels from its origins to the street. On the ground in the drug war for over a decade, earning the trust of those involved on all sides, Toby Muse takes us with him through the endless blood-soaked horror and economic logic at every level of the journey of the world's most alluring and dangerous drug. We come to meet and ultimately understand the tainted personal psychology and motivations of each player in this dark El Dorado. But there are no winners here. Anyone who tries to hold the power of the 'white goddess' cocaine is ultimately undone, violently stripped of their humanity, their souls and their lives in this endless, pointless dance of death.