The New York Times Book Review - Edward Dolnick
Reading Nemesis is like taking a walking tour of Baltimore's underworld with [The Wire's] Stringer Bell…Most true-crime accounts are heavy on car chases and shootouts, and light on analysis. Glenny turns that formula upside down. He is at his best in a quieter voice, sorting out why the police cannot simply swoop into a favela and arrest Mr. Big, and how street lookouts work and, especially, how a smart young Brazilian with a sick baby could transform himself into a crime lord.
Publishers Weekly
12/21/2015
Investigative journalist Glenny (DarkMarket) provides a grim look at Rio de Janeiro through the life of Antônio Francisco Bonfim Lopes, known as Nem, who up until his arrest in 2011 was one of Brazil's most-wanted criminals. Nem's path to crime reads like something out of a novel. Prior to 1999, when his infant daughter Eduarda was diagnosed with a serious and rare disease, Nem was a diligent employee of Globus Express, a magazine distribution company. Unable to raise the needed funds for treatment, Nem turns to Lulu, a local gang leader, who agrees to give him the money; the grateful Nem offers to work for Lulu to pay off his debt. This arrangement leads Nem to become a major drug dealer who "exercised immense authority over a community of 100,000 people," and who may even have managed to continue to direct his cartel's operations from behind bars. Glenny interviewed Nem in prison 10 times and is clearly sympathetic to him ("Nem is no paragon, nor is he the devil"), but still manages to offer a balanced look at his subject. He less successfully attempts to connect Nem's story to the broader context of human nature. Agent: Clare Conville, Conville and Walsh Literary Agency. (Feb.)
From the Publisher
Fearlessly reported with impressive detail….Mr. Glenny doesn’t preach or moralize. He shows that law enforcement in Rio is as problematic as the criminals, and in doing so, he paints what seems to be a true picture. This is a balanced book in the best sense.
Library Journal
02/01/2016
In 1999, with no criminal background, Antonio Francisco Bonfim Lopes was a typical resident of Rocinha, trying to figure out how to survive and support his family in one of Rio de Janeiro's largest favelas. Less than six years later he was known as Nem, in charge of the large criminal organization unofficially ruling over Rocinha. The story of Nem acts as the glue for this title, in which journalist Glenny (The Fall of Yugoslavia; DarkMarket) successfully explores the history of Rio de Janeiro, focusing on the violence, drug trade, politics, police forces, and related corruption within Rio's favelas since the 1960s. Weaving primary and secondary sources including jail cell interviews, Glenny recalls and builds upon previous accounts of criminal life in the settlements, such as Paulo Lins's City of God or the 2007 film Elite Squad. Glenny employs a writing style that both keeps the story moving and the reader wanting more. VERDICT This book is relevant for anyone interested in true crime stories, particularly involving the crime and corruption of Rio de Janeiro's favelas. [See Prepub Alert, 8/24/15.]—Jeremy Spencer, Univ. of California, Davis, Law Lib.
Kirkus Reviews
2015-11-24
A page-turning chronicle of the life and career of a favela don illustrates the larger challenges of a deeply impoverished, class-ridden Brazilian society. British author and former BBC Central Europe correspondent Glenny (DarkMarket: Cyberthieves, Cybercops and You, 2011, etc.) finds an inspiring subject in Antonio Francisco Bonfim Lopes, aka Nem, one of the most wanted drug running criminals in Rio de Janeiro, who has been imprisoned since 2011 in the high-security Campo Grande prison in Mato Grosso do Sul. Having interviewed him in prison multiple times over two years, the author vividly depicts the extraordinary career of this young don of the Rocinha favela—the largest of Rio's hundreds of slum neighborhoods—with enormous subtlety and sympathy, filling in his story by interviewing his family, enemies, colleagues, and others. Rocinha—the size of a small city in which tens, possibly hundreds, of thousands of residents live "cheek by jowl" with more middle-class districts of Ipanema, Leblon, and others—was adversely affected by the rise of the cocaine trafficking market in the 1980s, with drug lords taking turns running the favela economy, employing the gangsters, eliminating enemies, and generally keeping the peace with the Red Command. Having grown up in the favela, Nem was in his early 20s in 2000, a driver by trade and with a wife and sick daughter, when he solicited help from the current don, Lulu, borrowing money for his daughter's care and thus indenturing himself with the Mafia. From working for Lulu's "security" to gradually taking on more responsibility, Nem rose above the internecine gangster wars in 2004 and 2005 to take command in Rocinha at the time of Brazil's enormous economic surge and globalization. For five years, Nem ran the local welfare economy in relative harmony, until the military and civil police began a "pacification" program to rid the city of the drug trade—and clean it up for the World Cup and the Olympics. Glenny does an admirable investigative job, delving deeply into the complicated causes and effects of Rio's drug trafficking.
