Down By the River

[Richard Romeo]

Reading Down by the River by Charles Bowden (as
recommended by Malign recently here)--
an unrelenting view of the drug trade along the
Tex-Mex border--both a bird's eye view of politics,
foreign policy, e.g. but with a view from the street,
of families destroyed and fear in extremis all told in
a highly-charged, Cormac McCarthy-like style (ala the
Border trilogy--book weaves in and out b/w El Paso and
Juarez, the relations b/w the two nations, the
hypocrisy on both sides by individuals, corporations,
governemtns)
It has the historical scope of a book like Peter
Robb's look at the corruption of modern Italian gov't
society and the mafia but with the street smarts of a
book like Clockers (the movie sucked by the way).
Unrelently grim but honest, its pages are filled with
secrets and lies, ghosts, haunted houses, spectres of
the night, and lots of bad karma.
But quite a read. Bowden won't admit to getting at the
truth for he remembers that in Mexico people fear the
truth, seeing it as espoused by the government or by a
federale. In the US, we know the truth but either
don't speak of it or will it away.
Funny thing freedom--it's all quite relative as is the
truth.

rich

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