He describes the tribal boundaries between surfers and stoners on the Southern California coastline and between the sub-cultures of the California criminal underworld. He writes about the walls that separate the United States from Mexico, and the “Orange Curtain” that divides Orange County from the rest of California. Winslow’s best novels come alive along those borders. But on the ground, where Winslow works his magic, America is a collection of very distinct tribes divided by borders of every kind: both geographical and cultural, both real and imagined. It is a longstanding cliché to describe America as a “melting pot.” From 30,000 feet in the air, maybe that is what the country appears to be.

Winslow does something similar with his crime stories. George, Esquevedo and Dylan tell stories about the sinners and the saints lost and found along the borderlines of America. Winslow’s work may even be closer to songwriters like Lowell George, Alejandro Esquevedo and even Bob Dylan than to contemporary crime novelists. His best novels have the swagger of Elmore Leonard and the wit of Carl Hiaasen. Winslow’s back catalog deserve s as wide an audience as the one his current novels are enjoying. This year Winslow is poised to attract even more attention, with FX planning to turn the Cartel Trilogy into a series and Hollywood heavyweights bringing The Force, Winslow’s pull-no-punches crime novel starring a bent NYPD detective, to the screen. But have you explored the full depths of his work? If the answer is no, then now is the time to start. Today, if you follow crime fiction, then you know the name Winslow and you probably have one of his novels on your nightstand. The author of 18 crime novels has also become a powerful advocate for lesser-known crime writers and an increasingly vocal social critic. In the wake of his most recent book, The Border, the trilogy’s final installment, Winslow is riding a new wave of attention, with feature stories in The New York Times, Vanity Fair and Rolling Stone, to name a few. Since then, thanks to the breakout success of his epic Cartel Trilogy, Winslow’s popularity has soared among readers with a taste for hard-hitting, socially-engaged thrillers. Ten years ago, Don Winslow was a San Diego-based novelist with a small, but hardcore following of crime fiction aficionados.

Winslow the cartel