“God’s Middle Finger: Into the Lawless Heart of the Sierra Madre” ($15, Free Press) has an attention-grabbing premise: It’s hard to deny the dangerously romantic appeal of Mexico’s Sierra Madre, home to the narcotraficante who run cocaine and marijuana into Arizona, and the landscape is unique. But it’s hard not to roll one’s eyes while reading author Richard Grant‘s prologue about being chased through the woods by gun-toting Mexicans, which is followed by several chapters in which everyone warns him it would be suicide to enter the Sierra Madre as a white Brit who speaks no Spanish, can’t ride a horse and looks as though he’d be more at home pairing wines with a delightful braised duck dish than trying to outrun drug dealers. Seriously, people are shot there for wearing the wrong shoesthe only white tourists who go near it quickly pass through on their way to Copper Canyon. But Grant does it anyway and survives, and while the book can be a fun read — excellent history of the region, and we meet intriguing characters — it also feels mighty manufactured. As in, really, you were chased around by drug dealers in one of the most famous drug-trafficking places in the world? Next Grant will leap into a giant pit of rattlesnakes and write about the fact that he’s shocked, shocked! that they slithered all over him, and you should be impressed. Meet the author Tuesday at 7:30 p.m. at Tattered Cover Highlands Ranch (9315 Dorchester St.) and Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. at Boulder Book Store (1107 Pearl St.).
Kyle Wagner
