Cocaine Train: Tracing my Bloodline Through Columbia, by Stephen Smith (Abacus, £7.99 in UK)

Columbia is a frightening place, but it is where Channel Four journalist Stephen Smith discovered a lot about the secret life of his grandfather Leslie Frost. The story he tells is a mixture of family history and lively interpretation of modern-day Columbia, and his real skill lies in describing his daily encounters while unveiling the intriguing story of his pioneering railwayman grandfather. An upright citizen to everyone who knew him, behind the latter's serious demeanour was a man who had a second family - a Columbian mistress and a son. Cocaine Train isn't just an extraordinary personal tale - it will grip anyone interested in, or better still going to, Columbia. Smith tells it like it is. The vicious nature of life on the streets of Medellin and Bogota; the constant fear of kidnap or worse; the drug cartels and their legacy, it's all there in graphic detail.