Confidential Source Ninety-Six

In this straightforward yet guarded memoir, confidential informant Caribe provides an insider view of the criminal underworld in Southern California. A top lieutenant for the sadistic drug lord of a Mexican cartel, Caribe was arrested in Utah with 30 kg of cocaine and cut a deal with the feds: in exchange for a clean slate, he’d take down his boss. Failure would mean either years in prison or violent deaths for him and his family. Suspended between fear and hope, Caribe soon discovered he had a knack for a very dangerous game. Caribe, writing with NYPD detective Cea (No Lights), provides an absorbing, albeit self-serving, account of his fall from crime and rise as a crusader for justice. It was love for his wife, he explains, that led to his switching sides, not his arrest (which he argues wouldn’t have stood up in court). He admits to no part in his boss’s brutal violence and offers pro-forma regret for his role as a cocaine smuggler. Unfortunately, the near-complete absence of information about his background leaves him as opaque on the last page as he was on the first. Aficionados of stories about undercover policing and drug syndicates will enjoy the precise descriptions of the cat-and-mouse games throughout, but for those seeking greater insight into the author, this volume offers little more than an alias. (Aug.)