Journeys in the new Colombia

Short Walks from Bogotá

For decades, Colombia was the 'narcostate'. Now it's seen as one of the rising stars of the global economy. Where does the truth lie? How did a land likened to paradise by the first conquistadores become a byword for hell on earth? And how is it rebuilding itself after decades of violence? 
Writer and journalist Tom Feiling has journeyed throughout Colombia, down roads that were until recently too dangerous to travel, talking to people from former guerrilla fighters to nomadic tribesmen and millionaires. Vital, shocking, wry and never simplistic, Short Walks from Bogota unpicks the tangled fabric of Colombia to create a stunning work of reportage, history and travel writing. 
 
Books of the Year 2012 Boyd Tonkin, The Independent 
 
'Creates a portrait of Colombia that is perceptive, unsensational, and full of humanity ... Feiling is a brilliant reporter, lucid, unflinching, morally engaged, and with an occasional deadpan sense of humour .. one of the most consistently intelligent and compelling books to have appeared on any South American country in recent years' Michael Jacobs, Independent 
 
'Tom Feiling takes us on an enlightening journey through a changing country that few understand' Rachel Aspden, Observer 
 
'A deeply political account of one man's journey to the violent heart of modern, rural, Colombia ... a must read' Kevin Howlett, Colombia Politics 
 
'Feiling... venture[s] into areas that have been off limits for decades ... the sense of a vibrant nation worth discovering peeks out' Siobhan Murphy, Metro 
 
'The best British travel writers like Norman Lewis or Bruce Chatwin give the reader more than simple travellers' tales. Feiling is of their company ... a brilliant, penetrating and highly readable account' Robert Carver, Spectator 
 
Some of the best insights in the book come from the people Feiling meets, and memorably portrays ... a well-written, thoughtful book David Gallagher, Times Literary Supplement 
 
Dramatic and captivating Wanderlust 
 
'Elegantly written and knowledgeable. Feiling writes with the eye of a seasoned journalist and the style of a travel writer' Carl Wilkinson, Financial Times 
 
Tom Feiling spent a year living and working in Colombia before making Resistencia: Hip-Hop in Colombia, which won numerous awards at film festivals around the world, and was broadcast in four countries. In 2003 he became Campaigns Director for the TUC's Justice for Colombia campaign, which organizes for human rights in Colombia. His first book was The Candy Machine: How Cocaine Took Over The World, which was based on over sixty interviews with people involved in all aspects of the cocaine business and the 'war on drugs,' and was published by Penguin in 2009.

Creates a portrait of Colombia that is perceptive, unsensational, and full of humanity ... Feiling is a brilliant reporter, lucid, unflinching, morally engaged, and with an occasional deadpan sense of humour .. one of the most consistently intelligent and compelling books to have appeared on any South American country in recent years

Tom Feiling takes us on an enlightening journey through a changing country that few understand

A deeply political account of one man's journey to the violent heart of modern, rural, Colombia ... a must read

Feiling... venture[s] into areas that have been off limits for decades ... the sense of a vibrant nation worth discovering peeks out

The best British travel writers like Norman Lewis or Bruce Chatwin give the reader more than simple travellers' tales. Feiling is of their company ... a brilliant, penetrating and highly readable account

Some of the best insights in the book come from the people Feiling meets, and memorably portrays ... a well-written, thoughtful book

Elegantly written and knowledgeable. Feiling writes with the eye of a seasoned journalist and the style of a travel writer

Tom Feiling spent a year living and working in Colombia before making Resistencia: Hip-Hop in Colombia, which won numerous awards at film festivals around the world, and was broadcast in four countries. In 2003 he became Campaigns Director for the TUC's Justice for Colombia campaign, which organizes for human rights in Colombia. His first book was The Candy Machine: How Cocaine Took Over The World, which was based on over sixty interviews with people involved in all aspects of the cocaine business and the 'war on drugs,' and was published by Penguin in 2009.

How Cocaine Took Over the World

The Candy Machine

Cutting through the myths about the white market, Tome Feiling's The Candy Machine is the story of cocaine as it's never been told before.Gabrielle unwinds at weekends with a line of coke - and also works for a major police force. Juan Pablo is a drugs mule in Bogotá who gets his stash from a sweathouse. Belica started picking coca when she was eleven. Kurt Schmoke, former mayor of Baltimore, thinks legalization's the only way ... 
 
 Cocaine is big business. Governments spend millions on an unwinnable war against it, yet it's now the drug of choice in the West. How did the cocaine economy get so huge? Who keeps it running behind the scenes? 
 
 In The Candy Machine Tom Feiling travels the trade routes from Colombia via Miami, Kingston and Tijuana to London and New York. He meets Medellín hitmen, US kingpins, British crack users and Brazilian traffickers, and talks to the soldiers and narcotics officers who fight the gangs. 
 
 'An important study of the cultivation, usage and suppression of cocaine' &amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;Financial Times 
 
 'The Candy Machine is highly addictive' &amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;Metro 
 
 'It is hard to decide if Tom Feiling's future lies as a QC or the new Paul Theroux. A vivid, argumentative, arresting book' &amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;Sunday Telegraph 
 
 'I've read a few documentary accounts of the rise of cocaine, and this might be the best of them' &amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;Evening Standard 
 
 Tom Feiling is an award-winning documentary film-maker. He spent a year living and working in Colombia before making Resistencia: Hip-Hop in Colombia, which won numerous awards at film festivals around the world, and was broadcast in four countries. In 2003 he became Campaigns Director for the TUC's Justice for Colombia campaign, which organizes for human rights in Colombia. His book Short Walks from Bogotá: Journeys in the new Colombia is published by Allen Lane.

The Candy Machine is highly addictive

It is hard to decide if Tom Feiling's future lies as a QC or the new Paul Theroux. He has written a vivid, argumentative, arresting book

I've read a few documentary accounts of the rise of cocaine, and this might be the best of them. It's clear, sharp and solid. Very well told

An important study of the cultivation, usage and suppression of cocaine

A cracking read . . . Strong stuff, beautifully argued

Tom Feiling is an award-winning documentary film-maker. He spent a year living and working in Colombia before making Resistencia: Hip-Hop in Colombia, which won numerous awards at film festivals around the world, and was broadcast in four countries. In 2003 he became Campaigns Director for the TUC's Justice for Colombia campaign, which organizes for human rights in Colombia. This is his first book.

Cocaine is big business and getting bigger. Governments spend millions on an unwinnable war against it, yet it's now the drug of choice in the West. How did the cocaine economy get so huge? Who keeps it running behind the scenes? 
 
In The Candy Machine Tom Feiling travels the trade routes from Colombia via Miami, Kingston and Tijuana to London and New York. He meets Medillin hitmen, US kingpins, Brazilian traffickers, and talks to soldiers and narcotics officers who fight the gangs and cartels. He traces cocaine's progress from legal 'pick-me-up' to luxury product to global commodity, looks at legalization programmes in countries such as Switzerland, and shows how America's anti-drugs crusade is actually increasing demand. 
 
Cutting through the myths about the white market, this is the story of cocaine as it's never been told before.

Tom Feiling

A beautiful, measured meditation … This, Feiling points out, is our future too … All the more reason or us to take a close interest in what works – and doesn’t in Japan

Alone in Japan is an excellent and humane piece of reporting … [it] gives a compelling sense of Japan today. Feiling is a sympathetic, fair-minded interviewer, and his descriptions of urban and rural Japanese life are atmospheric and evocative … A sensitive and thoughtful book

It is hard to decide if Tom Feiling's future lies as a QC or the new Paul Theroux. He has written a vivid, argumentative, arresting book

Feiling is a brilliant reporter, lucid, unflinching, morally engaged, and with an occasional deadpan sense of humour

The best British travel writers like Norman Lewis or Bruce Chatwin give the reader more than simple travellers' tales. Feiling is of their company ... a brilliant, penetrating and highly readable account

I've read a few documentary accounts of the rise of cocaine, and this might be the best of them. It's clear, sharp and solid. Very well told

A Journey to the Future

No sex. No kids. No future? 
 
When Tom Feiling moved to Tokyo as a student in the early nineties, Japan was a beacon of the future: a rising superpower, a technology giant, and a global symbol of prosperity, civility and success. When he returned twenty-four years later, the country was still a sign of things to come – but, he began to realize, it was no longer a beacon. It was a warning. 
 
This book offers a unique portrait of life in contemporary Japan, from the quiet of its furthest flung villages to the dynamism of its megacities. It tells the story of how, from the mid-seventies onwards, Japanese society unknowingly embarked on a vast, silent process of transformation that is still unfolding today. The country is still peaceful; it is still prosperous. But the population is shrinking. As things stand, it will fall by a third with each new generation. 
 
Travelling through shrines and bars, rice fields and mango farms, coffee shops and old peoples’ homes, Feiling meets those affected by, and driving, this transformation. Through countless interviews and extensive research, he weaves together a powerful account of how and why men and women are ceasing to pair off and have kids. He reveals how sexual appetites and behaviours are both shaped by, and reshaping the evolving economy, and considers the risks – and the opportunities – of the rise in solo living in Japan, and beyond. 
 
Clear-sighted and surprising, Alone in Japan is a portrait of love, sex and death in contemporary Japan that should provoke and engage us all. It is an electrifying portrait of a nation on the brink by one of the most original reporters working today.

Tom Feiling

Praise for Alone in Japan

A beautiful, measured meditation … This, Feiling points out, is our future too … All the more reason or us to take a close interest in what works – and doesn’t in Japan

Alone in Japan is an excellent and humane piece of reporting … [it] gives a compelling sense of Japan today. Feiling is a sympathetic, fair-minded interviewer, and his descriptions of urban and rural Japan ...

- - Praise for Tom Feiling

A beautiful, measured meditation … This, Feiling points out, is our future too … All the more reason or us to take a close interest in what works – and doesn’t in Japan

Alone in Japan is an excellent and humane piece of reporting … [it] gives a compelling sense of Japan today. Feiling is a sympathetic, fair-minded interviewer, and his descriptions of urban and rural Japan ...

- - Praise for Tom Feiling

A beautiful, measured meditation … This, Feiling points out, is our future too … All the more reason or us to take a close interest in what works – and doesn’t in Japan

Alone in Japan is an excellent and humane piece of reporting … [it] gives a compelling sense of Japan today. Feiling is a sympathetic, fair-minded interviewer, and his descriptions of urban and rural Japan ...

- - Praise for Tom Feiling

Books by Tom Feiling

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