I am a Taxi by Deborah Ellis

I am a Taxi is a book about drug production in Bolivia. The main character, Diego, is a young Bolivian boy who lives with his mother and sister in a prison. His mother and father are in separate prisons. They were jailed for producing cocaine. Diego works as a "taxi" for prisoners. Since he is not convicted of a crime he can come and go as a he pleases. A "taxi" is someone who does errands for the people in the prison in exchange for money. He runs errands like buying food and clothing for prisoners. Prisoners in the jail have to provide their own food.

Diego works hard as a taxi but is not able to make enough to support his family comfortably. One day his best friend, Mando, tells him about a way to make more money. Diego tells his mother that he will be staying with his father in the men's prison for a few weeks. Instead he and Mando go to work for a drug cartel out in the jungle. Their job is to make coca paste, which is then processed into cocaine. I will stop here because I don't want to give away the whole plot of the book, but it is very exciting. I learned a lot about the process by which coca leaves are turned into cocaine and about the cruelty the cartels.