Nice work until you get arrested (Mr Nice - Howard Marks)

Name: sandrabarber

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Product:	Mr Nice - Howard Marks
Date:	30/12/01 (146 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Pacy, Exciting, Funny

Disadvantages: He's a naughty boy

Howard Marks, son of the Welsh valleys, Oxford student and international dope smuggler, writes his autobiography with the speed and panache with which his life has been lived.

Initiated into the joys of marijuana whilst at Oxford, Howard quickly spies an opportunity to make money fast. Dope is really taking off in the halls of academia and it’s pretty difficult to get hold of. What is needed is an entrepreneur with nerves of steel who can supply the ever-increasing demand.

And so Marks begins a life of globe-trotting, money-making, crime, police-evasion and subterfuge that is the stuff of action movies.

At one point Howard had 43 aliases (some of which are used as chapter headings throughout the book), of which Mr. Nice was one. He also had over eighty phone lines going, and owned 25 'respectable' companies which traded dope throughout the world.

Howard justifies his profession with his belief that marijuana is not harmful, and attempts to separate himself totally from those involved with the Class A trade with whom he will not knowingly deal or mix.

Throughout it all, he smoked his product constantly, which sort of refutes the claims of the anti-marijuana brigade that the stuff makes you lazy/incapable/slow.

Indeed, the only harm the drug seems to do to Howard is that it ends up getting him jailed for 25 years (of which he serves 7) in Terre Haute Penitentiary, Indiana, after being extradited from Spain. During this time he remains an enterprising soul and takes the opportunity to get himself a degree in law.

Along the way to prison, Howard gets involved with MI6, the CIA, the IRA and the Mafia, and a host of almost comic-book baddies and characters who all help to make the book a rollicking good read in true 'Boy's Own' style.

Marks is a natural raconteur and you can't help but warm to his charm and wit despite your reservations about what he does for a l
iving and the trauma his wife and family suffer wondering where he is. What he’s up to, whether he’s alive or dead and when he’ll next re-enter their lives and expect it all to be accepted as totally normal.

Marks does seem to be in denial about the anxiety and grief he causes his family and the wider implications of the dope trade.

Smoking the stuff might not hurt him, but what about those forced to grow it illegally as the only way to survive in poverty-stricken societies, the death and violence that come with any multi-billion pound illegal trade, and the danger to himself and his family incurred by his very high profile in the international 'underworld'. These issues do get mention but are skated over with a joke and a devil-may-care insensitivity.

That said, you can't deny that, like a naughty child, he never meant any harm. He is also very open about his own failings, and does at the end come some way to acknowledging the effects of his life on his nearest and dearest.

Marks' writing style is fast and flowing, and even the detailed business-like sequences have pace. And his humour underpins the whole show, making you laugh and gasp as his incredible tale unfolds. It is an extraordinary story very well told, and has all the exciting escapism of a first-class thriller.

Marks is now a real crowd-puller on the lecture circuit and I’m not surprised. He has the wit and charm of David Niven with a life story to tell that is as exciting as any tightly-plotted thriller.

Summary: