Pun Salad

It's the story of a couple of California marijuana growers, Ben and Chon; they have mastered the secrets of producing dynamite weed, and have reaped a fortune doing so. They share a girlfriend, Ophelia, a fact that is described explicitly.

Unfortunately, a Mexican drug cartel has noticed their operation. After Ben and Chon decline its initial offer of partnership, it turns out to have been one of those offers they couldn't refuse. The cartel kidnaps Ophelia in order to gain leverage. The boys must attempt to keep the cartel happy, in order to keep Ophelia alive, until they can ransom her. And, perhaps unwisely, they attempt to raise the ransom by ripping off the cartel itself.

Winslow's style is offbeat, short sentences in short paragraphs, unusual use of whitespace, occasional passages are rendered in screenplay format. This didn't bother me as much as the ending in which <spoiler>nearly everybody dies, including Ben, Chon, and Ophelia</spoiler>. I didn't care for that much.

This book has been made into a movie, recently released. Trivia: one of the high points of the book was its description of Ophelia's airheaded mother, who she calls "Paqu", for "Passive Aggressive Queen of the Universe". Uma Thurman played Paqu, but—what were they thinking?—all her scenes were cut for time constraints. Sigh.