NEW INSIDER EXPOSE NOVEL ABOUT A WOODSTOCK MARIJUANA TRADER WHO TAKES THE READER ON A RIVETING ADVENTURE. THE EXOTIC LIFE GOES AWRY WHEN THE U.S GOVERNMENT USES THE HERB SMUGGLER TO ALTER THE CAMBODIAN NATIONAL ELECTION THEN TRIES TO ELIMANATE HIM
After years of moving tons of herb by air, land and sea, A.R.Torsone’s (aka Max) number had finally come up. A pair of identical twin brothers, in the organization, had become government informants. Their Green Beret training, Machiavellian persona’s, and bonds to the Intelligence community in Bangkok had made them lethal opponents. The traitors orchestrated a plan to draw Max, back into the shadow world for one last mission…… after years of voluntary retirement.
The twist is when Max, is used to alter the 1998 national election in Cambodia. As a result, Max is kidnapped by Khmer soldiers and left to die in Asia’s notorious “T3” prison in Phnom Penh. There he grew tired of eating maggots, high fevers, starvation, and managed to escape. Six days later Max was abducted, this time by the C.I.A, in front of the U.S embassy in Phnom Penh. From here on things took a devastating turn.
Max’s, story circumnavigates the earth and brings the reader on a perilous and politically eye opening journey. It was a risky business: the rescue mission off the coast of Saipan during a tropical storm nearly turned fatal. Most difficult of all Max was torn between the love for his daughters and always that last operation.
The cast of real characters includes a Khmer warlord, C.I.A operatives, D.E.A informants and agents, the U.S ambassador and personnel within the U.S embassy in Phnom Penh, Asian pirates, Thai and Khmer generals, and the powerful leader of an ancient Southeast Asian nation. In this spiritual land of ghostly stone temples, a hauntingly beautiful girl from Bangkok, Thailand had risked her life for Max. Her bravery, loyalty, and unyielding love in the face of imminent danger were overwhelming. What the Khmer soldiers had done to her is permanently etched into Max’s soul. This was Cambodia’s most turbulent era since the Pol Pot regime and he was placed at the center of it.
Max’s, story reveals the little-known methods used to propel our foreign policy in poor, underdeveloped countries, and the schemes that drive the invisible economy. It also exposes the dark side… those who utilize the unlimited power of our government for their own self-serving gains. Max cannot forget the treacherous calamity…. the sordid chess game over the politics of contraband.
Max may have been wrong…..but not quite as wrong as they were. HERB TRADER is written in the powerful first person, enabling the reader to feel the adrenalin that escaping death delivers, or to feel the quite sadness after a successful mission. On the other side of the planet Max, found a land where he could thrive. A place far away from puritan restraints, a place where Max, had discovered eastern cultures and more importantly….. his need to find his way home.
“As one who worked in Cambodia during the time of his capture, Arthur Torsone is lucky to have survived his imprisonment in Phnom Penh’s T3 Prison and lived to tell his tale. Arthur Torsone’s Herb Trader is a story too bizarre to make up, his cast of characters includes: American mercenary twins, a flamboyant British pot dealer, double-dealing Khmer Rouge warlords, hardball Cambodian politicians, bent DEA informants, and more. Anyone interested in the marijuana trade, international intrigue, or “an easy scam in Southeast Asia” should read this candid insider’s account of the marijuana trade.”
– Peter Maguire, Associate Professor of History, Bard College and author of Law and War: An American Story and Facing Death in Cambodia
Press Contact:
Barbara Jean Foley
tisnifty@aol.com
(617) 842-3578
Woodstock Mountain Press
P.O. Box 1116
Monroe, NY 10949
www.herbtraderbook.com
BOOK STATISTICS:
ISBN 978-0-578-01292-6
Library of Congress Control Number- 2009928204
Page Count 334
Availability: Ingram, Baker and Taylor, Amazon, US, Europe and Canada.
REVIEW COPIES AVAILABLE UPON REQUEST
