I found myself alternately crazy bored and truly engaged with Booth’s narrative. Essentially he tries to cover everything regarding this subject and does an admirable job – stuffing 4.54 kilograms of crap into a five pound bag, so to speak. Whereas I was less engrossed with the quite detailed technical descriptions of opium harvesting and processing early on, budding criminal scientist types no doubt want more. Overall, the author weaves together a story encompassing addicted 18th century Brits, 20th century international smuggling operations, money laundering mechanisms, inevitable CIA involvement, 19th century international smuggling operations, global scientific, medical, and legal developments, gangsters, coolies, militias, and Hollywood actresses – seemingly the whole gamut. If I ever really did, I certainly no longer desire any more information about opiates! Anecdotes that I’ll remember for at least a few weeks include the falseness of TV detectives licking product at a bust (purer stuff might addict them instantly), Elvis’s ironic contribution to Nixon’s war on drugs declaration in 1971, and how an Englishman can write just like a US author except when it comes to mentioning “goals” (for incarceration).

Aside from my typically superficial observations, Booth offers a considerate thesis – based on a very sophisticated historical account – about the multifarious issues revolving around the role of opium growth in developing territories, the resultant drug problems in developed nations, and the various criminal (and often governmental) machinations that connect these contemporary poles. ( )