First published 1995
During the late 1980s and early 1990s, Vietnamese war refugees created one of America's most brutal criminal organizations. These young men had lost their families to violence and found themselves abandoned in an unfamiliar country. They adopted their gang's name from words they remembered seeing on American military equipment during the war. T.J. English examines how these displaced children of conflict carved out territory in America's Asian criminal underworld through extreme violence. The book reveals how organized crime was transforming as traditional Italian American syndicates lost power. A new multicultural criminal economy was emerging across the United States. English documents this shift by following the gang members themselves, showing their daily struggles to achieve their own twisted interpretation of American success. The story exposes the human cost of this criminal transformation, tracking individuals caught between their traumatic past and their violent present as they pursued wealth and respect through brutality.
Genres: sociology, crime, non-fiction, true-crime
Vibes: dark, emotional, fast-paced, thought-provoking
Tropes: human-cost, organized-crime, traumatic-past
Setting: America, United States
Period: 1980s, 1990s
310 pages · Hardcover · William Morrow & Co
Content warnings: violence