The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration estimates that Americans in the early 1970s were smoking upwards of 35,000 pounds of marijuana per day. By the time the decade drew to a close, Time magazine reported that reefer had become “the most widely accepted illegal indulgence since drinking during Prohibition.”

You can thank Jimmy Moree for helping to feed America’s insatiable pot habit. Nicknamed “Jimmy Divine” for his teetotaling ways, he would become one of the most successful marijuana traffickers of the 1970s, smuggling high-grade South American weed across the tempestuous seas into North American ports of call.

He was born and grew up poor in the Bahamas. That life was forever changed on a morning jog when Jimmy literally stumbled onto several million dollars’ worth of prime Colombian grass. He disposed of the weed with a little help from a law-enforcement friend and was surprised to earn over three hundred thousand dollars for his trouble. It was the first deal of many. The money was easy, and the perks fantastic. Jimmy went on to make, and give away, a fortune.

And now award-winning journalist John McCaslin is telling Jimmy’s story. Several of the characters are identified by their actual names or by nicknames. Identities of others have been changed to protect the guilty. Rest assured, you’re in for a white-knuckle ride on the open seas where adventure, enterprise, and entire fortunes go up in smoke.

“McCaslin brings his exceptional reportorial talent to bear in a fascinating exposé of the drug trade.”—G. GORDON LIDDY

“Told in a breezy, witty style, McCaslin’s book captures moments in relatively recent Caribbean history when it was . . . possible to make a fortune by the ability to steer a boat stealthily through dangerous seas.”—MARK BOWDEN