A captivating work of investigative journalism focusing on drug trafficking.
This eclectic combination of journalism and academic research aims to debunk persistent myths about the drug trade in the United States.
Gundur observes that Americans’ perceptions of the illicit drug trade in their country are in many respects deeply inconsistent with the available evidence. While they often assume that it is driven by “members of a nefarious underworld far from the lives of decent people,” drug trafficking in American cities is largely run locally, either by gangs or various subcontractors, with little knowledge or contact with foreign cartels. Moreover, most of those gangs that facilitate the drug trade do not comprise immigrants, illegal or otherwise, but are groups forged in the violent crucible of the American prison system. Contrary to popular misconception, most immigrants are law-abiding and have no connection to the drug trade, and cities like El Paso, Texas, that share a border with Mexico are not engulfed in violent crime, but are among the safest in the U.S. Gundur meticulously unpacks the entangled underworld of drug trafficking, one he convincingly argues has only been strengthened by America’s irrational war on drugs. In addition, he limns a remarkable firsthand account of the immigration process, one that unfairly disadvantages those genuinely seeking asylum in the country from extraordinary dangers.
The author’s overview relies heavily on what he calls “gonzo research,” a process whereby he embeds himself in cities like Phoenix and Chicago in order to gain intimate knowledge by virtue of spontaneous conversations and unplanned experiences. The result of his 10 years of work is a vivid tableau of life in places like Juárez, Mexico, a needful corrective to the cinematic caricatures that present only the squalor of criminal enterprises. But Gundur’s depiction still struggles from internal contradictions. For example, on the one hand, he portrays Juárez as a “city of opportunity” where most families can lead normal lives. But he also criticizes the U.S. for failing to recognize how deeply the gang violence in Juárez has affected those attempting to escape to America. Similarly, he downplays the effect of drug trafficking on El Paso, but concedes: “In El Paso, you are never too far away from someone involved in the drug trade if you know where to look.” While the author is correct that the cartels have little presence in these cities and that the violence produced by the drug trade in places like El Paso is routinely overstated, he admits that El Paso is a “prime transshipment point” for drugs, the vast majority of which comes from Mexico. Moreover, the entire book rests on a clumsy caricature of those concerned with border security as bearers of “anti-immigrant sentiment,” precisely the kind of sweeping generalization he aims to undermine. The author also sometimes indulges in overstatement—one can reasonably criticize Donald Trump’s immigration policy as profoundly misguided and even ultimately inhumane, but Gundur never presents a compelling argument that its explicit design was to inflict cruelty. Despite these flaws, this book is an illuminating study and a valuable contribution to an issue shrouded in misconceptions.
Pub Date: Aug. 15, 2022
ISBN: 9781501764462
Page Count: 330
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Review Posted Online: March 21, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.
Words that made a nation.
Isaacson is known for expansive biographies of great thinkers (and Elon Musk), but here he pens a succinct, stimulating commentary on the Founding Fathers’ ode to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” His close reading of the Declaration of Independence’s second sentence, published to mark the 250th anniversary of the document’s adoption, doesn’t downplay its “moral contradiction.” Thomas Jefferson enslaved hundreds of people yet called slavery “a cruel war against human nature” in his first draft of the Declaration. All but 15 of the document’s 56 signers owned enslaved people. While the sentence in question asserted “all men are created equal” and possess “unalienable rights,” the Founders “consciously and intentionally” excluded women, Native Americans, and enslaved people. And yet the sentence is powerful, Isaacson writes, because it names a young nation’s “aspirations.” He mounts a solid defense of what ought to be shared goals, among them economic fairness, “moral compassion,” and a willingness to compromise. “Democracy depends on this,” he writes. Isaacson is excellent when explaining how Enlightenment intellectuals abroad influenced the founders. Benjamin Franklin, one of the Declaration’s “five-person drafting committee,” stayed in David Hume’s home for a month in the early 1770s, “discussing ideas of natural rights” with the Scottish philosopher. Also strong is Isaacson’s discussion of the “edits and tweaks” made to Jefferson’s draft. As recommended by Franklin and others, the changes were substantial, leaving Jefferson “distraught.” Franklin, who emerges as the book’s hero, helped establish municipal services, founded a library, and encouraged religious diversity—the kind of civic-mindedness that we could use more of today, Isaacson reminds us.
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.Pub Date: Nov. 18, 2025
ISBN: 9781982181314
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Aug. 29, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
PERSPECTIVES
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