Original Gangster: My Life as NYC's Biggest Baddest Drugs Baron - Couverture souple

Criminals are not born in a vacuum, and Frank Lucas is no exception. At the age of six he watched his cousin die in a lynching and in that moment of Southern brutality, Frank Lucas, notorious gangster, billion-dollar-heroin importer and true-life inspiration for the film American Gangster was born.

Original Gangster is the story of the most notorious black gangster to ever rule the streets of New York. He went from running numbers in the 50s, to importing millions of dollars of heroin in the 70s, before losing it all at the hands of a snitch. This is the ultimate tale of ambition, hubris and downfall. The original O.G., Lucas has gone down in history for his infamous business measure of cutting out middlemen in the drug trade, buying heroin directly from its source in Southeast Asia, and then smuggling it back in the coffins of dead US servicemen.

Seven years of Lucas' life were dramatised for the Hollywood blockbuster American Gangster, but this is the first time that the mythical figure tells the story himself. The book delves even further into his extraordinary story, showing just what a folk hero Lucas is to contemporary urban audiences. It's a brutally honest account of a gangster and his times.

'I was Frank Lucas. I supplied the streets of Harlem with heroin. It was my profession. And, like war, it came with casualties.'

Aged six, Frank Lucas watched his cousin die in a Ku Klux Klan lynching and in that moment of Southern brutality, the most feared, most legendary gangster to ever rule the streets of New York was born.

Original Gangster is the story of how one angry young boy fled to Harlem, where he went from running numbers to a billion-dollar drugs empire, before losing it all when the FBI finally swooped.

Lucas was notorious for cutting out middlemen by buying the purest heroin directly from source, smuggling it back from Southeast Asia in the coffins of dead US servicemen.

Part of his life was dramatised for the Hollywood blockbuster American Gangster, but now Frank 'Superfly' Lucas tells the whole extraordinary story himself, in hair-raising detail.