4 out of 4 stars
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Gringo: My Life on the Edge as an International Fugitive by Dan “Tito” Davis and Peter Conti is an idiosyncratic, action-packed biographical account of Dan’s thirteen-year run from the law. It’s an astonishing story, chronicling his wild adventures through different countries, identities and companionships. The fugitive began as an innocent entrepreneur, peddling drugs such as ephedrine, weed and small amounts of cocaine while not knowing fully what he was getting himself into. He later spent his life on the run for a crime he was falsely accused of, which was selling meth. The book follows him through his adventures in Colombia, Guatemala, Venezuela, Cuba, Germany, India and Thailand.
The writing was conversational, light-hearted and candid. The language was not meant to be the focus of this story, although its informal nature sometimes lent the narrative style a forced, overly-offhanded tone. Something I found fascinating about the narrative style was the gaping lack of feeling in the story. Although Dan touches upon emotions that he had felt at different events, they were described briefly in a few words, such as “I was scared,” even if the scene unfolding was an intense one. For this reason, I couldn’t quite get myself into the shoes of the character. On the other hand, there was an incredible amount of self-awareness in a logical sense. Often, Peter and Dan break down Dan’s logical process in an elaborate manner and spend time ruminating on how his previous logic was flawed. The introspective aspect of the story appears to be a deeply analytical one, and it was a pleasure to see how that panned out. It’s a type of process I don’t find too often in narrative-style books.
It was enjoyable to read accounts of the different places Dan took refuge in and how he avoided the law with the help of his associates or by finding loopholes in the system. The book gives the reader a glimpse into societies that most will never experience, as well as the activities in the underbellies of those societies. Through these anecdotes, the reader may experience an expansion of his or her understanding of the human condition. The social, behavioural and relational dynamics of these places were notably unique as they were distinctive to that time and built upon volatile premises during times of political upheaval. Peter and Dan struck an extraordinary balance between being honest and being compassionate when talking about different people and their cultures. There were a lot of characters and descriptions of cultures in this story. They take every person on a case-by-case basis, and rarely generalise a people or pass judgement on a culture, regardless of how out-of-the-ordinary their practices were to Dan. However, they still say what they want to say and recreate what Dan saw, not compromising on the story-telling of his experience.
One issue I had with this book was that it became well-paced only towards the end. In the beginning, there were so many characters and details that it was hard to keep track of them all. Dan’s adventures in Medellín, his first main destination, were extensively chronicled for a large part of the book. After that, it felt as though they lost steam to write about other places with the same enthusiasm, making the story more streamlined and fast-paced. However, it was not nearly as badly-paced as it could have been and was by and large a well-told and gripping novel. For this reason, I give the book 4 out of 4 stars. There were no typos and the book seemed to be well-edited. There was only one instance where I found a factual error, where Peter and Dan had used the word “Hindu” instead of “Hindi.” However, this is a common mistake and a widespread piece of misinformation, and I wouldn’t attribute it to a lack of editing.
I would recommend this book to adrenaline junkies who are interested in action or crime stories. I’d also urge anyone who wants more perspective on the variety of human lives to read this book. Finally, I’d prescribe Gringo to anyone who enjoys a bizarre story for its own sake.
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Gringo
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