Fear is Just a Word

''A work of journalistic brilliance and rare humanity'' GEORGE PACKER

''Truly a remarkable achievement'' JON LEE ANDERSON

''Ahmed writes about Mexico with uncommon authority and a broken heart'' GARY SHTEYNGART

''A stunning, colour-saturated portrait of the collapse of formal justice in one Mexican town'' STEVE COLL

Fear is Just a Word begins on an international bridge between Mexico and the United States, as fifty-six-year-old Miriam Rodriguez stalks one of the men she believes was involved in the murder of her daughter Karen. He is her target number eleven, a member of the drug cartel that has terrorised and controlled what was once Miriam''s quiet hometown of San Fernando, Mexico, almost one hundred miles from the US border. Having dyed her hair red as a disguise, Miriam watches, waits, and then orchestrates the arrest of this man, exacting her own revenge.

Woven into this deeply researched, moving account is