God's Middle Finger: Into the Lawless Heart of the Sierra Madre

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God's Middle Finger: Into the Lawless Heart of the Sierra Madre

3.93 of 5 stars 3.93 · rating details · 878 ratings · 198 reviews

Twenty miles south of the Arizona-Mexico border, the rugged, beautiful Sierra Madre mountains begin their dramatic ascent. Almost 900 miles long, the range climbs to nearly 11,000 feet and boasts several canyons deeper than the Grand Canyon. The rules of law and society have never taken hold in the Sierra Madre, which is home to bandits, drug smugglers, Mormons, cave-dwell...more

Paperback, 288 pages

Published March 4th 2008 by Free Press (first published 2008)

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Jan 03, 2012 Jeanette rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: nonfiction, travel-adventure, mexico

December 31, 2011 My recent reading about the border reminded me of this book, which tells about what happens in Mexico long before the drugs get anywhere near the border.

The author had a fascination with the lawless and very dangerous Sierra Madre region of northern Mexico. This area is ruled by competing narcotraficantes(drug traffickers) who produce staggering amounts of marijuana, opium, and cocaine. Law enforcement is so corrupt that there's no way to stop the problem.

Grant rather foolishly...more

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May 25, 2008 Nancy Oakes rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: nonfiction

You know that a) this is going be good and b) this is going to be different than anything you've ever read when the opening chapter finds the author being pursued by 2 crazy men with guns in the middle of the night out in the wilds of Durango, Mexico. Naturally, after you read that chapter, with a cliffhanger for an ending, you have to wonder how he got into this predicament and you're hooked. This book just didn't let up. Grant decides that he wants to traverse the Sierra Madre Occidental, a mo...more You know that a) this is going be good and b) this is going to be different than anything you've ever read when the opening chapter finds the author being pursued by 2 crazy men with guns in the middle of the night out in the wilds of Durango, Mexico. Naturally, after you read that chapter, with a cliffhanger for an ending, you have to wonder how he got into this predicament and you're hooked. This book just didn't let up. Grant decides that he wants to traverse the Sierra Madre Occidental, a mountain range just south of the border between Arizona & Mexico. The Sierra Madre goes south from there , for about 900 or so miles -- with canyons that are deeper than our Grand Canyon, with mines, caves, cliffs, potholed roads, little towns, drug farms and a variety of people. He begins his trip with a friend telling him not to do it but this doesn't stop Grant. Everywhere he goes he makes a new contact to help him into the areas where gringos should not be travelling alone -- often dangerous, often a bit hostile, filled with testosterone that leaks from the aura of Mexican male machismo. It's the kind of Wild West lawlessness and total anarchy that intrigues him and he finds what he's looking for everywhere he goes. At first the author really got into his journey, but after some bandit encounters, policemen trying to set him up while they share cocaine with him, the negative treatment of women by said macho men, and a brush with death, the author has had enough. But the getting there, for the reader, is a fun and wild ride that I won't soon forget. What a great book! Along with his own travels and travails, he's thrown in historical accounts of the area, biographical info about those who've lived and traveled there, and some interesting facts about the pointless war on drugs fought by the US that we're never going to win because of the huge drug economy stemming from the Sierra Madre. Incredibly interesting -- you won't want to put the book down.

Very highly recommended. I would think that most people would enjoy this book, especially people who like a sort of gonzo-feel to their reading.(less)

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Mar 21, 2008 Myke rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: nonfiction

WOW! I really had no idea about the Sierra Madre, what it was like there and how lawless and crazy it really is.
This book was so good, I'm going to have to go out and read everything Richard Grant has written. I really couldn't put it down.
Every little detail of every little town he was in was truly fascinating (at least to me anyways). I want to hear more about the Sierra Madra; however, I think to get any deeper, you would probably have to die.

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Apr 10, 2008 John rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: guys who like guns and readers who like edgy travel writing.

This is an engrossing, depressing gross-out of a book, and my feelings about it are wildly dissonant. In brief, it relates the author's travels in Mexico's Sierra Madre mountain range, an extremely large, rugged, and dangerous place, much of it bereft of any rule of law (unless the convenience of drug lords can be called that). The people who live there have such punishing lives that their grasp of reality has been twisted out of true and much of their magical thinking abets their misery. Everyo...more This is an engrossing, depressing gross-out of a book, and my feelings about it are wildly dissonant. In brief, it relates the author's travels in Mexico's Sierra Madre mountain range, an extremely large, rugged, and dangerous place, much of it bereft of any rule of law (unless the convenience of drug lords can be called that). The people who live there have such punishing lives that their grasp of reality has been twisted out of true and much of their magical thinking abets their misery. Everyone has a gun, everyone gets drunk as often as they can. Consequently, murders (and there are many of them) are frequently random or occur because of a trivial (or even imagined) slight. Although the landscape can be beautiful at a distance, close up it is polluted, the land punished by being over-farmed, over-grazed, and savagely deforested. A superficial glance shows that this is an awful place, and a closer glance reveals that things are even worse.

All this takes place in an area that is only a short drive from the USA and some of it happens just outside the view of visiting tourists. The narco lords have begun investing in hotels and resorts to encourage tourism and consequently brutally murder bandits who prey on the guests. Of course, this doesn't stop them from going about their regular and highly profitable drug businesses. (Reading this book, I discovered how necessary drug dealing is to the economy of Mexico, and, consequently, why the American war on drugs hasn't a hope.)

This is, in short, a painful book to read, and while the author acknowledges this, his personal quest to get himself into increasingly dangerous situations (until, at last, after he is hunted at night through a forest by drunken killers with an assortment of deadly weapons, he has his fill). This attitude might be the only one possible for a clear-eyed, deadly pessimistic, but not inhumane narrative such as this to get written, but I ended up liking the author less and less as I continued reading. The book's other flaw is that inhabitants of the Sierra Madre, many of them indigenous, are hardly forthcoming, and a person would have to live among them for months, possibly years, to get to know them. So, since this author was just passing through, too much of what he writes about is his failures to get to know them. There's too much of this and it is wearying.

Even so it was an eye-opening and gut-twisting read. (less)

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Dec 04, 2008 Patrick Gibson rated it 2 of 5 stars Recommends it for: people avoiding Bill Bryson

Shelves: road_trip, the_west

Let’s face it. I bought the book mainly because I thought the title was clever and funny. It was also set in my back yard (sort of). My buddy and I often take road trips to the Mexican border. We cross occasionally to have little adventures (mainly drinking in Juarez) so I was even more intrigued by what this book might offer.
It’s violent – but nothing like Cormac Mcarthy’s works of fiction. Then again Mr. Grant, I doth thinketh thou exaggerates enough to verge on fiction! Despite the overly dra...more

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Jul 22, 2008 Steven rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: maps, travel, geography

Richard Grant has written the kind of travel book I like -- attention to detail, crazy characters, historical backgound, and an easy-to-read writing style. If the Sierra Madre were a more appealing place, this book would make me want to go there. It's really not all that far away, after all.

One of Grant's skills as a writer is his ability to write so warmly about the beauty of the area he travels in, while at the same time juxtaposing it against the brutality of living in an anarchic drug-produc...more

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Jun 30, 2008 Rob rated it 2 of 5 stars

I am not really sure what the author intended with this book. It winds itself up nicely but never seems to go anywhere? The history of the SM is an interesting one. It's obviously a hard life and one that the addition of a corrupt society overrun with drug lords doesn't make any easier.

The author tries to investigate the SM region of Mexico and in doing so takes his life in his own hands. Some of the characters he meet along the way are interesting but the book seems rushed and incomplete. I fe...more

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Aug 24, 2010 Chuck rated it 4 of 5 stars

Well written, light, entertaining and quick read on the history and current (2008) state of the Mexican Sierra Madre mountain range. According to the book, the Sierra Madre Range historically has been so remote and rugged as to provide a sanctuary for anyone trying to avoid the government of Mexico.

Historically this included Apaches, Mexican Revolutionaries, American fugitives and Polygamist Mormans. In the current times drug dealers and growers, and an underclass of mountain peoples with a cod...more

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Mar 23, 2010 Benjamin rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: nonfiction

Often you hear people coming back to the United States from Mexico talking about how they avoided Cancun because they wanted to see something that was more authentic. While I fully encourage people to step out of the hotel zone, try some street food, and not set foot in Senor Frogs while in Mexico, I am always the first to also remind people that there are lots of parts of the “authentic Mexico” that most of us probably wouldn’t want to see. This book is about one of those parts of Mexico.

This b...more

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Apr 18, 2008 Jennifer rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: travelwriting

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Apr 08, 2009 Stephanie rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: read-in-2009, travel, nonfiction

I hate giving ratings, because to say I liked The Almost Moon as much as I liked this book would be erroneous, but I don't know that the phrase "really liked" would be one I'd associate with this either.

So nevermind the stars - I found the subject of this book to be utterly fascinating. Regardless of the extreme violence making headlines these days, I love Mexico and am intrigued by its people and culture. I've never been to the Sierra Madre, though, and this book made me realize that, while fa...more

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Nov 15, 2009 Kate rated it 4 of 5 stars

This super-macho piece of journalism over-makes the point that the Sierra Madre is a dangerous place, but the author's journey itself is fun and awful, and I don't mind joining him for it (particularly because I wouldn't want to go by myself). I kept drawing comparisons to "Facing the Congo," which gave me a constant feeling that the author had no business being where he was. I didn't feel that way about this book; Grant did not place subject after subject in mortal danger. I also like the idea...more

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Jun 23, 2008 HelenTheLibrarian rated it 4 of 5 stars

Whoa. - Travel in the Sierra Madre is not for the feint of heart. It is foolhardy and usually fatal. I am so glad that this man survived to write about it because it is a thoroughly entertaining wild ride from the safety of my armchair.

1 like · like · see review

Apr 28, 2009 Ron rated it 3 of 5 stars

This is a pretty entertaining, but ultimately less than fully satisfying, travelogue. The author is a freelance writer who decides to act out his gonzo-journalism fantasy of traveling through the Sierra Madre mountains to experience first-hand its wild topography, history, culture and people. He certainly does that, and does a fair job of describing the local color (to put it politely) which makes for some fun reading. But the ending is rather abrupt and seems to undermine not only the adventero...more

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Dec 23, 2011 Leslie rated it 5 of 5 stars

"We (the author and a local guide) got back in the truck and rolled slowly into the village. There were about two dozen shacks, most of them built out of crudely woven sticks and dried mud with palm-thatch or corrugated tin roofs. More often than not, they also had a solar panel, a TV satellite dish, and a big American pickup truck parked out front."

"'With the money from your first marijuana crop you buy clothes, jewelry, and guns,' said Gustavo. Then you buy your truck, your solar, your satelli...more

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Jan 18, 2013 Riley rated it 2 of 5 stars

This book feels very padded with uneven research, retelling of other authors, many historical anecdotes and tall tales. It reminds me of a gonzo version of very old travel writings, looking for and emphasizing the dangerous and exotic, and full of anecdotes about the area. He never did get to Sinaloa, as he felt it too dangerous. He's trying too hard and coming up with too little. I am left with the feeling that the book might be entirely fiction. One correction points out the narrow and spotty...more

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Jul 31, 2010 Bill rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: non-fiction, travel

Very good book about this crazy english dude who decides to go off by himself into the sierra madre mountains in mexico, where a good percentage of the people are drunken, homicidal drug dealers. not my idea of a good time, and it almost gets him killed. the sale of drugs from mexico to the us is a $50 billion a year business and 90% of all cocaine in the us comes from mexico. it's quite funny, in a twisted kind of way...these mexican drug lords still live in shacks but have $40,000 chevy pickup...more

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Feb 12, 2012 Chris rated it 3 of 5 stars

Richard Grant illuminates for us a world just south of the border that most Americans would find difficult to imagine. This is not the modern Mexico of Guadalajara. Grant shows us that the Sierra Madre Occidental Mexico is full of drugs, violence, oppression of women, and rhythmic narcocorridos celebrating this lifestyle. And while I do believe that these things all do exist in this area of Mexico, part of me wonders that if one sets out to a place that has very serious problems with the intenti...more

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Apr 15, 2009 BeerDiablo rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: non-fiction

Gain further insight into the surreal of Mexico and the erosion of native culture while drugs and violence escalate the embrace of “modern life”.

Highlight’s include:
1. A live version of “The Most Dangerous Game” hosted by beer drinking, coke snorting hillbillies with the author as the unfortunate "guest".
2. Beer drinking, cigarette smoking Indians beating North American runners in a marathon.
3. Religious celebration centered on drinking beer. [my favorite:]

Recommended for those that grew up in t...more

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Sep 14, 2009 Liz rated it 3 of 5 stars

This one is a light, quick read. He's a little rambly. I think that works. He's got a pretty good hold on his flaws and uses them to his advantage. Mostly, though, you can't make this stuff up. And you get a real sense of the journey. I had no idea that such a ridiculous, dangerous mountain range full of narcotraficantes existed in Mexico - but I guess the drug growers don't really want that published... Probably could have used a title tweaking. Like, abandon all words in front of the colon. St...more

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Jul 12, 2009 Spencer rated it 4 of 5 stars

This book is rough and tumble homo-eroticism at its finest... then why only the three stars? Well, it was also fairly slow and verbose in parts. But from the cross-dressing banditos, saints, and ranch hands to the gay tour guide who was often intimate with the uber-macho narco trafickers to the unbounded machismo that is at the root of so many of the Sierra Madres' crippling problems--murder and rape are unbelievably rampant--this was a well-written, often humorous look into the madness that inf...more

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Apr 14, 2010 Dan B. rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: People who are already scared of Mexico

Recommended to Dan by: Kate

Fun and frightening Gonzo journalism. Grant decides to go to the roughest parts of Mexico to see how rough-and-tumble it is, drink and snort coke until he can barely see straight, antagonize the people he meets, then see if anything happens. Whaddaya know? He gets himself chased by some local thugs. I guess all of this proves that Mexico - or at least the Sierra Madre - is a lawless country run by drug lords and bandits.

The book is well written and I read it in a few days. It is by no means a de...more

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Jun 28, 2012 Zohar - ManOfLaBook.com rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2012

God’s Middle Finger: Into the Lawless heart of the Sierra Madre by Richard Grant is a non-fiction book about the author’s “tour” of Mexico’s Sierra Madre region. Mr. Grant is a British journalist who came to the other side of the pond in search of strangeness and adventure – I think he found both.

Having had an “unfortunate fascination” with the Sierra Madre, Richard Grant decided to go the lawless frontier. Even though he was constantly told he was going to die, Mr. Grant ignored...more God’s Middle Finger: Into the Lawless heart of the Sierra Madre by Richard Grant is a non-fiction book about the author’s “tour” of Mexico’s Sierra Madre region. Mr. Grant is a British journalist who came to the other side of the pond in search of strangeness and adventure – I think he found both.

Having had an “unfortunate fascination” with the Sierra Madre, Richard Grant decided to go the lawless frontier. Even though he was constantly told he was going to die, Mr. Grant ignored those warnings until this warning almost came true.

Marked by almost reckless disregard to his own well being, the book is filled with wonderful detail and dark humor which brings forward this uncharted country.

God’s Middle Finger: Into the Lawless heart of the Sierra Madre by Richard Grant is a fast paced, sprawling adventure in a strange world which is closer then you think, and sometimes simply too close for comfort. While the book might be considered to be in the travel genre it is a glimpse into a lawless part of Mexico.

" The often mis-quoted line from Treasure of the Sierra Madre said by Gold Hat (played by Alfonso Bedoya) “Badges? We don’t need no stinkin’ badges” comes to mind and, of course, makes an appearance in the book. The country is lawless and any type of badge or uniform carry little weight – however, an introduction by a local (which means he vouches for you with his life) does.
For the record, the line is: 'Badges, to god-damned hell with badges! We have no badges. In fact, we don't need badges. I don't have to show you any stinking badges, you god-damned cabrón and chinga tu madre! Come out from that shit-hole of yours. I have to speak to you.'"

The area has historically been a home to outlaws, cowboys, renegades, bands of Apache and hermits. These days there are still many outcasts, Tarahumara Indians, Mormons, narcos, pot and opium farmers inhibit this forsaken land.

Throughout the book, Mr. Grant warns the reader time after time not to follow his footsteps. I’d listen to his advice as the prologue we meet the author as he tries to run away from coked out, drunken narcos who are hunting him for sport. The population of the area is a mix of tough, violent folks where the laws of the land seem not to have any affect. While guns are illegal in Mexico, everyone has one, murder is common, drunkenness, rape and revenge killing are all part of life. It is not uncommon for the women to be forced to marry their rapist if they get pregnant.

Even though the book deals with serious consequences of such a life, and a very dangerous trip the author makes – it is still funny and informative. The Tarahumara Indians, long distance runners who made a mockery out of the ultra marathon and refused to run a regular marathon because such short distances are only for women – caught my attention and had me laughing out loud.

For more reviews and bookish posts please visit: http://www.ManOfLaBook.com (less)

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Jan 27, 2012 Sara rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: non-fiction

This book was fascinatingly terrifying. I’ve always been interested in Latin America and its history, culture and politics so when a friend told me about this book I knew I had to read it!
The book’s first chapter grabs you and pulls you in as it appears to be a real-life version of The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell. The book then goes back to the beginning where Grant, a British reporter and writer, explains how he first got interested in the Sierra Madre and all the warnings he receiv...more

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Feb 06, 2011 Paul Pessolano rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Richard Grant is an Englishman who has had a fascination with the Sierra Madre mountains. The Sierra Madre is twenty miles south of the Arizona-Mexican border. It was the location for the famous Humphrey Bogart file, "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre".

This is the story of going into the mountains, sometimes with guides, sometimes not. After reading the book one wonders why anyone would venture into this lawless land. The area is controlled by drug dealers, and if there is any semblence of law, i...more

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Mar 20, 2010 Troy rated it 4 of 5 stars

The one-phrase rundown: this book was on sale for nine bucks and that’s a travesty.

I blasted through Grant’s travelogue quickly, finding his observations oddly reminiscent of my own. I squandered some particularly mis-spent youth on the Texas/Mexico border, watching the Sierra Madre oriental (east of Grant’s travels) hover in the hazy distance (west Texas – where mountains float and rainbows wait). I interacted with some unsavory characters and I wondered if everything I heard about the Madre’s...more The one-phrase rundown: this book was on sale for nine bucks and that’s a travesty.

I blasted through Grant’s travelogue quickly, finding his observations oddly reminiscent of my own. I squandered some particularly mis-spent youth on the Texas/Mexico border, watching the Sierra Madre oriental (east of Grant’s travels) hover in the hazy distance (west Texas – where mountains float and rainbows wait). I interacted with some unsavory characters and I wondered if everything I heard about the Madre’s hinterlands were true. How many gringos go blundering around the Copper Canyon country every year? Could narcos really be growing and moving so much stuff in broad daylight, with complete impunity? Looks like they were back then and things have gotten worse, if nothing else.

Grant went where many would like to go, but are either (a) afraid, like me, or (b) too smart. Many of his observations about the most inexplicable, saddening and maddening facets of the Mexican psyche were spot-on. For the life of me, I can’t imagine how he survived, but I’m glad he did. I suppose being willing to snort pico and drink until everyone else passed out, not to mention the muy importante folks he had either the luck or foresight to meet, didn’t hurt.

I particularly liked Grant’s comments on the apparent confusion and disarray of daily Mexican life. For me, one of the most compelling passages, aside from his ridiculous daily adventures, was his honest realization about the reality of what he was really doing. While drinking home-made booze with an old Tarahumara man in the backwoods of the Sierra Madre, far from consumerism and commercialism, Grant was standing on soil which has supported the likes of Poncho Villa and Apache holdouts like Geronimo. Indeed, the Sierra Madre landscape has not just stymied, but violently repelled every attempt at domestication, and Grant was seeking the thrill of being immersed in that lawlessness. But why? In his own words, he was getting his kicks – which is to say, curing his unbearable, completely safe and comfortable British boredom – in a place full of poverty and suffering, environmental and cultural destruction, orphans and widows from a slow-motion massacre. Rarely do adventure athletes, armed conflict-seeking journalists, or extreme risk junkies admit why they feel the need to risk life and limb.

The talking heads in the US foreign policy establishment are currently debating whether Mexico is a failed state, given the increasingly public clashes between the government and the narcos. Some of the kindest people I’ve ever known were Mexican, and I hope that, when the dust settles, the leaders of their country won’t be funded by the pot and coke addicts of the United States.
(less)

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Apr 30, 2013 Jerometed rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: favs

God's Middle Finger belongs to the class of books I find most valuable: books that have pushed my self to the point where determining an angle to approach them becomes an exercise in recognizing my limitations.

To attempt an objective report on the words between the covers: Richard Grant, a white native of England has written about his travels in and attempts to explore the communities of Mexico's Sierra Madre mountains. This includes descriptions of the food, clothing, livelihoods, attitudes an...more God's Middle Finger belongs to the class of books I find most valuable: books that have pushed my self to the point where determining an angle to approach them becomes an exercise in recognizing my limitations.

To attempt an objective report on the words between the covers: Richard Grant, a white native of England has written about his travels in and attempts to explore the communities of Mexico's Sierra Madre mountains. This includes descriptions of the food, clothing, livelihoods, attitudes and norms of the people he met. And finally, the exploration he did sought more to survey and traverse the geography than to explore or seek human power structures- a choice motivated by self-preservation.

The difficult and reward of reading the book doesn't come from detached observation, though. That comes from the struggle inherent in integrating even any basic portion of the context of the adventure into my view of how the world works.

For example, fundamental assumptions like my right to exist and identity don't seem to translate. I'm a citizen of the united states that carries cards with numbers corresponding to entries in government databases, credentialed by educational institutions, supported by my relationship with businesses. None of that would hold any meaning whatsoever to the natives, outlaws, farmers and 'police' of the mountains, where a person's very right to exist seems tenuous in the best circumstances and wholly contingent on the approval and goodwill of current residents of whatever village or area the traveler enters. By that I mean Mr. Grant would not visit new areas until he knew residents to name-drop and had a 'friend' to guide him, because to do otherwise would be to risk being killed as an unknown person.

If that setting wasn't foreign enough, a place so remote that people will rob trucks for soda, where people have to grow or kill their own food, where generational feuds have wiped out families, tribes, and entire villages, drugs have been introduced. And not just the razor wire of power structures that surround something so valuable that can be produced so cheaply in an environment bereft of the social defenses created by education or functional government. The drugs themselves are freely consumed, with cocaine playing the same role as hard liquor in our society, while complimenting the sense of machismo American culture lacks, a force that says fuck or be fucked, twisting the world to the point where a refusal to drop everything and drink to unconsciousness with armed strangers is a grave insult inviting murder if handled poorly.

I don't know where to go from there. You probably have trouble imagining it— I still do and I read the whole book. (less)

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Mar 03, 2010 Heyhansen rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2010-non-fiction

This book is probably even more enjoyable having read it while in Mexico, but anyone that's interested in things south of the border and adventure will probably enjoy it. The summary seems to be that Mexico is basically one giant drug farm and that it's so messed up and integrated that there's pretty much no solution. It confirms and strengthens most of the usual fears about Mexico which, while perhaps a bummer, is also likely fairly accurate - especially in the regions the book takes place. Whe...more

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Jan 03, 2009 Vince Darcangelo rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: reviews, nonfiction

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/news...

This review originally appeared in the ROCKY MOUNTAIN NEWS

God's Middle Finger: Into the Lawless Heart of the Sierra Madre
Vince Darcangelo , Special to the Rocky

Published March 21, 2008 at 12:05 a.m.

God's Middle Finger: Into the Lawless Heart of the Sierra Madre

* Nonfiction. By Richard Grant. Free Press, 277 pages. Grade: A-

Plot in a nutshell: You'd have to be a little bit crazy to travel alone through Mexico's Sierra Madre mountain range, an inhospitable...more

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Oct 02, 2008 Richard rated it 1 of 5 stars

Nancy Perl, Seattle's celebrity librarian, has a method for deciding when to abandon a book, and for someone like me that's a serious act, akin to betrayal, but here it is - up until the age of 50 you give the author 50 pages, and if (s)he hasn't gotten to you by then you can let the book go. For every year past 50, you give the author one less page, so by the time you reach 99, if the author hasn't grabbed you on page one, you can feel free to drop it, (it will probably slip out of your hand as...more

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About Richard Grant

Richard Grant is a freelance British travel writer based in Arizona. He was born in Malaysia, lived in Kuwait as a boy and then moved to London. He went to school in Hammersmith and received a history degree from University College, London. After graduation he worked as a security guard, a janitor, a house painter and a club DJ before moving to America where he lived a nomadic life in the American...more

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Books by Richard Grant

American Nomads: Travels with Lost Conquistadors, Mountain Men, Cowboys, Indians, Hoboes, Truckers, and Bullriders

Crazy River: A Journey to the Source of the Nile

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