The Power of the Dog

From the New York Times bestselling author of The Cartel comes an explosive novel of the drug trade that takes you deep inside a world riddled with corruption, betrayal, and bloody revenge.

The prequel to The Cartel, and set about 10 years earlier, The Power of the Dog introduces a brilliant cast of characters. Art Keller is an obsessive DEA agent. The Barrera brothers are heirs to a drug empire. Nora Hayden is a jaded teenager who becomes a high-class hooker. Father Parada is a powerful and incorruptible Catholic priest. Callan is an Irish kid from Hell's kitchen who grows up to be a merciless hit man. And they are all trapped in the world of the Mexican drug Federación. From the streets of New York City to Mexico City and Tijuana to the jungles of Central America, this is the war on drugs like you've never seen it.

Dennis Lehane
"The Power of the Dog throws shadows a mile long. Fearless, humane, aesthetically fervent, it's also passionate, unapologetic, gorgeously written and unquestionably authentic."

Lee Child 
"Sensationally good...the near-perfection of The Power of the Dog...an integral part of a solid-gold whole."

Esquire 
 "You should try to get your hands on everything Winslow's written, because he's one of the best thriller writers on the planet."
-Benjamin Percy

Los Angeles Times 
"Winslow has delivered two of the most . . . emotionally resonant novels in the past decade, 2005's The Power of the Dog and its epic conclusion, The Cartel. . . . His prose is sparse and ferocious, and his rapid-fire story hits you like bullets from an AK-47."
-Ivy Pochoda

The San Diego Union-Tribune 
"Blasts off like a rocket . . . The Power of the Dog burns with rage at the badly flawed U.S. war on drugs."

The Daily Telegraph (London)  
"It is impossible in a few words to do justice to Don Winslow's The Power of the Dog...The hero's determination is passionately portrayed, and his personal crusade makes a memorable and thought-provoking novel."

The Baltimore Sun
"An express train of a thriller that cannot be put down. . . . One of this year's finest novels."

The Washington Post
"A pit bull of a book. Once unleashed, this thriller . . . charges and attacks without mercy, shredding anyone in its path. . . . A well-tuned plot, driving rhythm, intelligence and a touch of politics. . . . A page turner."

The Chicago Tribune

"Powerful. . . . A heartbreaking chronicle of the drug wars between the U.S. and Mexico, which is biblical in its dramatic scope and in the classic beauty of its prose rumbling in the background like heavenly thunder."

The Dallas Morning News

"A rippingly good thriller. . . . It fumes, it smokes, it burns; it soars, it pitches, it cascades along."

Publishers Weekly

"The war on drugs is powerfully dramatized in Winslow's ambitious, dense and gritty latest . . . Winslow's depth of research and unflagging attention to detail give the story both heft and immediacy, and his staccato, present-tense prose shifts easily among wildly disparate settings and multiple points of view. A complex plot, well-drawn characters and plenty of double-crossing make this a thinking person's narco-thriller."

Dan Fesperman, author of The Warlord's Son
"This book comes at you like a champion boxer, deft and probing, and bristling with menace. Aiming for both the head and the gut, it connects solidly with every punch."

T. Jefferson Parker, author of California Girl
"The Power of the Dog is the most compelling crime novel I've read in several years. It's sharply written, vertiginously fast, and best of all it's about something. In the unholy trinity of narcotics, dollars and politics Winslow has located our heart of darkness. This is a spectacular novel, disturbing and unforgettable."
 
S.J. Rozan, author of Absent Friends

"With an epic's scope and a freight train's rush, The Power of the Dog is an absolute page-turner. I couldn't put it down and I was sorry when it ended. As always, Don Winslow delivers!"-

Ken Bruen, author of The Killing of the Tinkers
"From the heart-wrenching very first sentence I was hooked. A soaring, blazing saga of the real drug world, it is masterly, moving, and compassionate: an instant classic. It's been a long wait since Winslow's wondrous California Fire and Life. Was it worth the wait? Was it ever, and then some."

Robert Ferrigno, author of The Wake-Up

"Don Winslow's The Power of the Dog is a great read. Intricate, powerful, and fierce, it takes the reader into the moral labyrinth of the international drug trade and the men who lose their souls along the way. Winslow's knowledge and insight have never been more fully realized. I believed every word of it."

Andrew Vachss, author of Down Here

"The Power of the Dog is a steaming cauldron of crime, corruption, and cabals, an epic of Godfather proportions with just enough fact sprinkled into the stew to make this one fabulous fable."

James Ellroy, author of Perfidia

"The Power of the Dog is the first great dope novel since Dog Soldiers thirty years ago. It's frightening and sad, with a superbly sustained intensity. It's a beautifully compressed vision of hell, with all its attendant moral madness."-James Ellroy, author of The Cold Six Thousand

Don Winslow is the critically acclaimed, award-winning, internationally bestselling author of nineteen novels, including The Power of the Dog, Savages, The Winter of Frankie Machine and The Cartel.  A former investigator, anti-terrorist trainer and trial consultant, Winslow lives in Southern California.