American Desperado

My Life as a Cocaine Cowboy

By: Jon Roberts, Evan Wright

Narrated by: Christina Rooney, Erik Davies, Johnathan McClain, Kimberley Farr, Kirby Heyborne, Mark Bramhall, Mark Deakins, Steve Kramer

American Desperado is possibly the most jaw-dropping, event-filled, adrenaline-soaked criminal autobiography ever written. Like a real-life Scarface Jon was born into the upper levels of the Gambino crime family and witnessed his first murder at age seven. He became a one-man juvenile crime wave before joining an assassination squad in Vietnam. He returned to New York at age 20 to become one of the city's top nightclub promoters, then journeyed to Miami where he became the de facto transportation chief of the Medellin Cartel, and along with a tech-wizard partner, created some of the most sophisticated smuggling technologies ever. With a hulking 6'6" bodyguard always at his side, and a rural fortress protected by mortars, tear-gas cannons, and a gold-fanged attack dog, Roberts was brutally effective at what he did. To law enforcement, he was known as the "Bearded Gringo," a spectre they could never touch. To United States senators and CIA officials, he was "the guy who can get things done". He eventually formed a clandestine alliance with the US government and in the end found personal late-life redemption.

©2011 Jon Roberts and Evan Wright (P)2011 Random House AudioGo LTD

Top Notch

Where does American Desperado rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

The best

What about the narrators’s performance did you like?

good

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

I was just in amazement at how it all worked

Any additional comments?

Incredible story, Incredible life. really good listen, I loved it. this story is no holds bar account of a serious bad boy!!

gripping and gritty real-life crime

Very well presented, with multiple actors voicing the protagonist and other supporting players. The format is mostly in the first person as a memoir, with the occasional authors note and press 'clippings' interspersed.