On December 2, 1993, on a rooftop in Medellín, a heavyset bearded man kicked off his sandals and ran barefoot along the tiles toward one more escape. He didn't make it. To the soldiers standing over the body he was a monster finally destroyed; to the crowds who mobbed his funeral, clawing to touch the coffin, he was a saint of the slums. To understand how a farmer's son from the Andes became a billionaire, a mass murderer, and a myth, you have to go back to a childhood shaped by La Violencia, where death came at night and safety was something you arranged yourself.
ALL ABOUT PABLO ESCOBAR is a fast, immersive, and richly detailed portrait of the most wanted man on the planet: the polite, soft-spoken boy who never raised his voice, the smuggler who turned cocaine into an industry, the politician who wanted to be loved, and the terrorist who taught a country that fear is a language.
Inside, you'll discover:
- La Violencia, Medellín, and the paisa creed that measured intelligence by profit
- The cousin, Gustavo, and the teenage hustles that became a cartel
- The rise of cocaine and the fortune too vast to count or even store
- Plata o plomo: the congressman, the folk hero, and the war on the Colombian state
- The bombs, the prison he built for himself, and the manhunt that closed the net
- The barefoot death on the roof and the saint the slums still mourn
Part of the ALL ABOUT collection: short, modern biographies for readers who want the full story of a remarkable life without reading 800 pages to get it.
One coffee. One sitting. One unforgettable life.