I'm pleased to announce the printing of a new edition of my true-crime Caribbean classic Turning The Tide, written with Peter Abrahams, which will be available for electronic download and can be ordered in paperback in a new an updated edition in February 2010.
As fans of my book know, this is a true story of an American college professor who helped bring a ruthless cocaine kingpin to justice. In writing it, I sought to plunge the reader into the savagery of the 1970's war against drugs and to dramatize the death-defying improvisations of one man with the courage of his convictions.
When college professors Richard Novak took his sabbatical on Norman's Cay in the Bahamas, the most dangerous creatures he expected to face were the hammerhead sharks he was studying. But then a "real estate developer" named Carlos Lehder Rivas showed up on the island. Those who defied him simply disappeared and his "resort" soon sported gun towers and an airstrip large enough to land DC-3 cargo planes. Norman's Cay had become a nerve center of the Medellin Cartel, the world's largest drug operation.
Intrigued by Novak's work, Lehder let him stay; it was a the worst mistake the drug lord ever made. For soon the two men were locked in a titanic clash of wills--a psychopath with a multi-million-dollar empire and a renegade army, versus a lone Bible-reading academic with a .357 Magnum.
When the DEA and the local officials refused to act, Novak used his underwater expertise to mount sabotage missions and gather evidence, eventually helping to bring Lehder to his dramatic, headline-making downfall.
Unfolding with the breathtaking immediacy of a thriller, this fascinating true story pits one brave man against a global cocaine cartel in a modern-day David-and-Goliath tale that proves that there are still a few heroes left in the world.
