{"title":"Richard Stratton","description":"\u003cp\u003eDelve into the gritty world of Richard Stratton, where crime, redemption, and counterculture collide. Perfect for fans of true crime and urban thrillers, discover Stratton's raw and unflinching narratives.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"defending-alice-book-richard-stratton-9780063115460","title":"Defending Alice","description":"“Gripping courtroom drama and social commentary . . . the story flows well . . . [the author is] masterful in building suspense.”—Kirkus Reviews  Set in 1920s New York, an addictively readable, thoroughly entertaining historical novel involving sex and secrets, race and redemption, and power and privilege—based on a sensational real-life case that made international headlines—in which the marriage between a working-class black woman and the scion of one of America’s most powerful white families ends in a scandalous annulment lawsuit.  When Alice Jones, a blue-color woman with at least one Black parent marries Leonard “Kip” Rhinelander, the son of one of New York’s most prominent society families, the scandal rocks high society—and eventually sets the city afire when Kip later sues for an annulment, accusing Alice of having hidden her “Negro blood” and intentionally deceiving him that she was white.  While New York society in the Roaring Twenties witnessed more than a few scandals, the real-life Rhinelander case set tongues wagging and became perhaps the most examined interracial relationship in American history. In Defending Alice, Richard Stratton reimagines this remarkable story, from the couple’s courtship through their controversial marriage to their shocking divorce trial and its aftermath. Chronicled by Alice’s attorney, brilliant trial lawyer Lee Parsons Davis, and told in flashbacks and entries from Alice and Kip’s fictional personal diaries, this epic page-turner vividly brings to life the New York of a century ago—a world seemingly far removed yet tragically familiar to our own.  Stratton brilliantly evokes this dazzling era in all its glamour and excess, and in retelling the Rhinelander story, explores issues of sex, race, class, prejudice, and justice that are as relevant today as they were a century ago when this headline-making trial took place.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ GARDNERS","offer_id":49741417414929,"sku":"NGR9780063115460","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50784156975377,"sku":"CIN0063115468G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"US \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":50999202316561,"sku":"NIN9780063115460","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0063115468.jpg?v=1750939769"},{"product_id":"altered-states-of-america-book-richard-stratton-9781560257776","title":"Altered States of America","description":"Altered States of America is a riveting collection of journalism by outlaw-turned-author Richard Stratton.  Stratton's years as an international marijuana smuggler, his 8-year bid in a federal prison system, and subsequent ascendance to acclaimed author and filmmaker, give him the credibility with which to wrest an uncommon truth from his subjects.  The stories in this collection read like adventure fiction.  To name a few: the story of Greg Scarpa, a Columbo mob captain turned informant; Bonecrusher, a guard at Corcoran penitentiary who witnessed the bloody gladiator fights between convicts; the CIA's top-secret MK-ULTRA program in which the CIA secretly dosed unsuspecting civilians and its own agents with LSD, or the heartbreaking profile of Joe Stassi, America's oldest living gangster, who was ordered to murder his best friend.  Each piece is linked by Stratton's reflections on and connections to the people and places he describes.  Whether he is talking with Oliver Stone or a prison guard, Hunter S.  Thompson or a gangster, Sean Penn or a CIA agent, Stratton has an empathetic understanding of his subjects. This collection truly embodies Bob Dylan's famous line: \"To live outside the law, you must be honest. \"","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":49917093642513,"sku":"CIN1560257776G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":50111120081169,"sku":"GOR013859284","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50917560779025,"sku":"CIN1560257776VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ WELL_READ \/ SBYB","offer_id":51727961751825,"sku":"CIN1560257776A","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1560257776.jpg?v=1751276151"},{"product_id":"smuggler-book-richard-stratton-9781760294236","title":"Smuggler","description":"Richard Stratton was the unlikeliest of kingpins. A clean-cut college boy who entered outlaw culture on a university trip to Mexico, he saw his search for a joint morph into a thrill-filled dope run smuggling two kilos across the border in his car door.  He never looked back.                                     Stratton became a member of the hippie mafia, travelling the world to keep America high, living the underground life while embracing the hippie credo, rejecting hard drugs in favour of marijuana and hashish. With cameos by Whitey Bulger and Norman Mailer, Smuggler tells Stratton's adventure while centring on his last years in the business as he travels from New York to Lebanon's Bekaa Valley to source and smuggle high-grade hash in the midst of civil war, from the Caribbean to the backwoods of Maine and from the Chelsea Hotel to the Plaza. As Stratton's fortunes rise and fall, he's pursued all the while by his nemesis, a philosophical DEA agent who respects him for his good business practices.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49932692652305,"sku":"GOR008773279","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ GARDNERS","offer_id":51182779564305,"sku":"NGR9781760294236","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1760294233.jpg?v=1751059368"},{"product_id":"in-the-world-book-richard-stratton-9781628727272","title":"In the World","description":"\u003cb\u003eThe Hollywood Ending of an Adrenaline-Filled and, By Turns, Harrowing and Funny Odyssey of Crime and Redemption in America's War on Drugs\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eSmuggler's Blues\u003c\/i\u003e, the first book in Richard Stratton's memoir of his criminal career, detailed his years as a kingpin in the Hippie Mafia. \u003ci\u003eKingpin\u003c\/i\u003e, the second book, traced his eight-year journey through the criminal justice system, through two federal trials and myriad jails and prisons, and culminating in his success as a self-taught jailhouse lawyer in winning his own release. In this final volume, Stratton recounts his return to civilian life, as a convicted felon who had been forced to confront his demons and an aspiring writer who yearned to make his mark. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e From parole to Hollywood to marriage and fatherhood, he found his way in the free world. Working in the New York office of a criminal defense attorney, he somehow adhered to the stringent conditions of his release not to associate with other felons. When his prison novel \u003ci\u003eSmack Goddess\u003c\/i\u003e was published, his mentor, Norman Mailer, entered his life again. Going to Hollywood to consult on a documentary, he became a writer and producer, and his feature film \u003ci\u003eSlam\u003c\/i\u003e won major awards at Sundance and Cannes. \u003ci\u003eIn the World \u003c\/i\u003eincludes profiles of celebrities such as Mailer, Oliver Stone, Sean Penn, and others.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50227536691473,"sku":"CIN1628727276VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":53103658107153,"sku":"CIN1628727276G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1628727276.jpg?v=1750896238"},{"product_id":"rottweiler-book-richard-f-stratton-9780866221535","title":"The Rottweiler","description":null,"brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50291603308817,"sku":"CIN0866221530G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0866221530.jpg?v=1750884216"},{"product_id":"smack-goddess-stratton-book-richard-stratton-9781559720465","title":"Smack Goddess Stratton","description":null,"brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50381572374801,"sku":"CIN1559720468G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ WELL_READ \/ SBYB","offer_id":51328653066513,"sku":"CIN1559720468A","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1559720468.jpg?v=1750829966"},{"product_id":"smuggler-s-blues-book-richard-stratton-9781628726688","title":"Smuggler's Blues","description":"Goodfellas meets Savages meets Catch Me If You Can in this true tale of high-stakes smuggling from pot’s outlaw years.      Richard Stratton was the unlikeliest of kingpins. A clean-cut Wellesley boy who entered outlaw culture on a trip to Mexico, he saw his search for a joint morph into a thrill-filled dope run smuggling two kilos across the border in his car door. He became a member of the Hippie Mafia, traveling the world to keep America high, living the underground life while embracing the hippie credo, rejecting hard drugs in favor of marijuana and hashish. With cameos by Whitey Bulger and Norman Mailer, Smuggler’s Blues tells Stratton’s adventure while centering on his last years as he travels from New York to Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley to source and smuggle high-grade hash in the midst of civil war, from the Caribbean to the backwoods of Maine, and from the Chelsea Hotel to the Plaza as his fortunes rise and fall. All the while he is being pursued by his nemesis, a philosophical DEA agent who respects him for his good business practices.    A true-crime story that reads like fiction, Smuggler’s Blues is a psychedelic road trip through international drug smuggling, the hippie underground, and the war on weed. As Big Marijuana emerges, it brings to vivid life an important chapter in pot’s cultural history.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ WELL_READ \/ SBYB","offer_id":50395681423633,"sku":"CIN1628726687A","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":51155847577873,"sku":"CIN1628726687VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":51729855119633,"sku":"CIN1628726687G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1628726687.jpg?v=1751089425"},{"product_id":"slam-book-richard-stratton-9780802135759","title":"Slam","description":"Includes the screenplay to the motion picture, the poetry featured in the film, and behind-the-scenes filmmaker's and actor's diaries telling the story of the making of Slam, a movie about urban poverty and the redemptive power of art.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50763049238801,"sku":"CIN0802135757G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":51007346802961,"sku":"NIN9780802135759","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52820997898513,"sku":"NLS9780802135759","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0802135757.jpg?v=1751464766"},{"product_id":"defending-alice-book-richard-stratton-9780063115484","title":"Defending Alice","description":"“Gripping courtroom drama and social commentary . . . the story flows well . . . 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While New York society in the Roaring Twenties witnessed more than a few scandals, the real-life Rhinelander case set tongues wagging and became perhaps the most examined interracial relationship in American history. In Defending Alice, Richard Stratton reimagines this remarkable story, from the couple’s courtship through their controversial marriage to their shocking divorce trial and its aftermath. Chronicled by Alice’s attorney, brilliant trial lawyer Lee Parsons Davis, and told in flashbacks and entries from Alice and Kip’s fictional personal diaries, this epic page-turner vividly brings to life the New York of a century ago—a world seemingly far removed yet tragically familiar to our own.  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Captured in the lobby of the Sheraton Senator Hotel at LAX following a fifteen-year run smuggling marijuana and hashish as part of the hippie mafia, Richard Stratton began a new journey. Kingpin tells the story of the eight years that followed, through two federal trials and the underworld of the federal prison system, at a time when it was undergoing unprecedented expansion due to the War on Drugs. Stratton was shipped by bus from LA's notorious Glass House to jails and prisons across the country, a softening process known as diesel therapy. Resisting pressure to falsely implicate his friend and mentor, Norman Mailer, he was convicted in his second trial under the kingpin statute and sentenced to twenty-five years without the possibility of parole.  While doing time in prisons from Manhattan's Criminal Hilton to rural Pennsylvania, Virginia, Kentucky, and New York, he witnessed brutality as well as camaraderie, rampant trafficking of contraband, and crimes by both guards and convicts. He first learned the lessons of survival. Then he learned to prevail, becoming a jailhouse lawyer and winning the reversal of his kingpin sentence and eventual release.  Kingpin includes cameos by Norman Mailer, Muhammad Ali, and John Gotti, and an account of the author's friendship with mafia don Joe Stassi, a legendary hitman from the early days of the mob who knew gangsters Meyer Lansky, Bugsy Siegel, and Abe Zwillman and has insights into the killing of Dutch Schultz and the Kennedy assassination.  Kingpin is the second volume in Richard Stratton's trilogy, Remembrance of the War on Plants.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"- \/ - \/ -","offer_id":51454129701137,"sku":"","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":51454130159889,"sku":"CIN1628727268G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":52107334418705,"sku":"CIN1628727268VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1628727268.jpg?v=1750800117"}],"url":"https:\/\/www.worldofbooks.com\/collections\/author-books-by-richard-stratton.oembed","provider":"World of Books ","version":"1.0","type":"link"}