Synopses & Reviews
Drawing on unparalleled access to sources including lawyers, The Weed Runners is both journalistic exposé and adventure story. There is a vast network fueling the ongoing nationwide explosion of medical marijuana, and this book focuses on an incredibly dynamic three-year period from 2009 to 2012. During that time, marijuana left the world of illegality and blossomed into a mainstream industry, becoming the fastest growing economic engine in California before the feds swooped in and put pot back in its “proper” place. This fast-moving and exciting account examines the lives of the people involved in todays marijuana trade as well as recent developments in the federal war on medical marijuana, giving readers a first-hand look at Americas quasi-legal medical marijuana trade.
Review
"The Weed Runners is the ultimate ride along; a sharp-eyed trip into the kaleidoscopic world of fantatical growers, righteous stoners, and the tie-dyed enterpreneurs who are turning the War on Drugs upside down and bringing medical marijuana to the people." —Mark Haskell Smith, author Heart of Dankness: Underground Botanists, Outlaw Farmers, and the Race for the Cannabis Cup
Review
"For this feverish, wild-eyed, and ever-lapidary engagement of the medical marijuana industry, Nicholas Schou has drawn from his 16 years experience covering this malleable trade. The result is a book that mimics its unforgettable "characters" (wonderfully nicknamed Racer X, Art Nouveau, Yoga Girl, The Serial Killer, et. al.)-- sometimes surprisingly businesslike, often deliciously ragtag, and ever eager to impart unexpected information, anecdote both twitchy and sobering, and, most importantly, the sort of breathless entertainment found in our best political thrillers, except very, very real."— Matthew Gavin Frank, author of Pot Farm and Preparing the Ghost
Review
"The Weed Runners is brilliant journalism - vivid, exciting and important. Schou has the rare gift of making complicated topic fully human - it lives and breathes in this book. If you want to understand where this country is in the so-called War On Drugs, The Weed Runners is a must read." —Don Winslow, author of Savages and The Kings of Cool
Review
"...valuable look at the way Californias medical marijuana law and the crackdown against it have affected people of all walks of life."—Kirkus Reviews
Review
"Readers expecting a Hunter Thompson-esque account of pot dealers may be surprised: this is, ultimately, a business book (although one written with panache)." -Booklist
Synopsis
Make no mistake: the US government's hundred-year-old war on marijuana isn't over. Some 20 million Americans have been arrested on marijuana charges so far. The American marijuana industry remains underground, where modern-day moonshiners who view themselves as tomorrow's Johnnie Walkers continue to take immeasurable personal risks to fulfill America's incessant demand for weed.
Drawing on unparalleled access to sources ranging from lawyers to cannabis club owners, from outlaw cultivators to industry entrepreneurs, The Weed Runners is both journalistic expos and adventure story.
About the Author
Nicholas Schou is the author of Kill the Messenger: How the CIA's Crack-Cocaine Controversy Destroyed Journalist Gary Webb and Orange Sunshine: The Brotherhood of Eternal Love and Its Quest to Spread Peace, Love, and Acid to the World. He is an award-winning investigative journalist with OC Weekly who has also written for LA Weekly, the San Francisco Bay Guardian, and the Los Angeles Times. He lives in Long Beach, California.