An often chilling account of the heroin trade from a Boston Herald reporter. Having done some stories on heroin addiction in Boston, Cox put together a sort of expedition to trace the drug to its source: the rebel Shan State of Burma, a remote, outlaw kingdom of jungle lowlands, impenetrable mountains, and fierce rivers. Cox connected with a sometime Hollywood actor and soldier of fortune, Barry Flynn, who set up an interview with General Khun Sa, the Shan State warlord who in 1994 controlled 60 percent of the world's heroin manufacture. (In an epilogue, Cox informs us that Khun Sa has since retired, in effect turning over his business to the Burmese government.) Cox travels with difficulty through the Shan State, visiting a poppy field and even trying some raw opium, but his arduous trek to reach Ho Mong, Khun Sa's opium town, is anticlimactic. The general seems neither evil nor wise; he offers up long-winded platitudes, Ö la Castro, about the hospitals and schools he's built, his own patriotism, and the stupidity of the American Drug Enforcement Agency. Otherwise, Cox has written rather a chaotic book: His portrait of the Bangkok sex trade is entertaining, but this information is available elsewhere; and his adventures with his traveling companion, Jay Sullivan, a man obsessed with the MIA/POW issue, would have been better served in another narrative entirely. Cox appears to admire writers such as Hunter Thompson and Michael Herr, but he lacks their sense of focus. Even so, the Shan State material is dynamite. There's the general's own two-step detox program, for instance: cold turkey in a dark pit, followed by beheading if the treatment doesn't take. Cox is a trifle disorganized, but at his best he takes you where no one else has been. (10 illustrations, not seen; 2 maps)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 1996
ISBN: 0-8050-3863-9
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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