Original Gangster
My Life as NYC's Biggest Baddest Drugs Baron
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- 11,99 €
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Beschreibung des Verlags
Criminals are not born in a vacuum, and Frank Lucas is no exception. At the age of six he watched his cousin die in a lynching and in that moment of Southern brutality, Frank Lucas, notorious gangster, billion-dollar-heroin importer and true-life inspiration for the film American Gangster was born.
Original Gangster is the story of the most notorious black gangster to ever rule the streets of New York. He went from running numbers in the 50s, to importing millions of dollars of heroin in the 70s, before losing it all at the hands of a snitch. This is the ultimate tale of ambition, hubris and downfall. The original O.G., Lucas has gone down in history for his infamous business measure of cutting out middlemen in the drug trade, buying heroin directly from its source in Southeast Asia, and then smuggling it back in the coffins of dead US servicemen.
Seven years of Lucas' life were dramatised for the Hollywood blockbuster American Gangster, but this is the first time that the mythical figure tells the story himself. The book delves even further into his extraordinary story, showing just what a folk hero Lucas is to contemporary urban audiences. It's a brutally honest account of a gangster and his times.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
From a sharecropper's shack in North Carolina to the top of Harlem's drug trade, Lucas recounts his eventful life in vivid detail. After witnessing his cousin's murder by the Klan in 1936, Lucas began stealing food for his family at age six, graduated to assault and robbery, and made his way to Harlem in 1944 at age 14. Smart and ruthless, he became the right-hand man of notorious gangster Bumpy Johnson, who controlled numbers rackets around the city. After Johnson's death in 1968, Lucas began his drug empire. He cut out the middleman (importing from Southeast Asia a heroin so pure it was nicknamed Blue Magic ). Law enforcement finally caught up with him in 1975. Sentenced to 40 years, Lucas only served six after agreeing to identify some crooked cops. Lucas finally told his story to a journalist and in 2007 the movie American Gangster, based on his life, was released. With journalist King's aid, Lucas is a straightforward yet compelling narrator, never making excuses for his life of crime, though he has come to regret it. 8 pages of color photos.
