American Pain: How a Young Felon and His Ring of Doctors Unleashed Americas Deadliest Drug Epidemic | 
pickHighly engaging audiobook for a road trip. Temple thoroughly covers how the mega-clinic American Pain began and follows them all the way through the prison sentences for most, but not all, of the oxycodone drug dealers. Truly disgusting how complicit the doctors were in feeding the habits of addicts, and how much money the idiot felon made running his pill mill empire in Florida. Of course in Florida.
pickIt‘s easy to confuse AMERICAN PAIN with AMERICAN KINGPIN. Both are nonfiction first person narratives involving young men who were able to manipulate the law to carry out illegal criminal activity & both stories are highly absorbing. I was riveted to the audio and just shocked by the callousness displayed & implemented by employees, doctors, Purdue Pharma, wholesale pharmacists, technicians and the masterminds behind the “pill mill” scam. 👇🏼
Wow!! I feel SO naive!!!!! I‘m just shocked as to what addicts will do. This book is unbelievable! I‘m transfixed 😱This is a great recommendation @Megabooks 💊 💊💊💊💊
I love this #audiobook, but was #Justice served putting a few pill mill operators behind bars, even if they were the largest in the country at the time? It‘s hard to overstate the havoc they‘ve wrought in my home state.
In the Star Trek episode, one of the characters is given an unfairly harsh punishment, but I wonder if the punishment for these pill pushers was too light. 🤔
#StarTrekSummerMay Day 2
pick#nonfiction2019 #sawonlitsy thanks to @megabooks for posting about this book! Yes, this sure was a crazy good listen! True crime story of the rise and fall of some “larger than life” characters who built up a “mobster-like” pill-mill operation in Florida, earning millions through distribution of massive quantities of legal opioid pain meds to addicted patients. It had a major influence on the rising opioid epidemic in the nation. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
pickThis book is so good! It‘s about how two former felons built the biggest pill mill in the country, and how it was taken down by the police. Really great narrative #nonfiction and would be a good book for anyone interested in the opiate crisis. Narrator is great if you‘re interested in audio.
#audibook #audible #narrativenonfiction tagging some of my nonfiction buddies!
so-soGreat story! I wish it had been more factual and less narrative. I would have liked more details on how laws have changed and what the present state of the situation is.
@Jenshootsweddings is an excellent chooser of books I've added to my Litsy TBR and forgotten about! 😂 I'm so excited to read both of these, especially the tagged one because I live in what many consider the epicenter for said drug epidemic. (And I agree that Dreamland was fantastic, Jen!) Thank you so much for the books and the awesome Canada swag -- you're the best international match I've had! 😉
#HalloweenGoesPostal #FallBookExchange
Well, I took #readwhiteandblue a little differently: 4 books about America. American Pain: the opiate crisis, American Hookup: hookup culture at universities, A Vast Conspiracy: the Starr investigation of the Clinton presidency, and Democracy in Black: race and politics in America. Happy 4th fellow Americans!! #jubliantjuly #sizzlinsummerreads
pickThis book is so worth the read. It's disgusting and shocking that so many "respectable" institutions-- everyone from doctors to pill wholesalers to foundations to pharma--were greedy enough to profit from addiction. A criticism: the author could have made the "clinic's" victims more visible. No interviews with people who bought drugs from the clinic, and the portrayal of an overdose victim's loved one was a little condescending & callous.
So I worked in communications at an addiction treatment network for two years and I thought I was fairly familiar with pill mills and the opioid crisis, but oh my god. I never really imagined such a brazenly criminal (in the ethical sense) enterprise, enabled by wholesalers, pharma, industry-backed foundations and doctors happy to profit off of it, dealing drugs in broad daylight because it's COMPLETELY LEGAL.
pick4/5 stars! Intriguing story about a topic I knew little about. The story of American Pain gave background on OxyContin, the convicts who made millions off the sale of the drugs (and their enjoyment of spending that fast cash), the effects of FL drug laws on nearby states, and the FBI investigation. I'm with the tattooed muscle man who is serving time now...."Why the f--- were we allowed to be able to sell it in the first place?"
Well, my hip pain woke me up in the night again when my medicine wore off. ☹️☹️ I'm going to try not to take any more medicine because I want to go to work if I can. Part of the problem is I don't know why it started.
Also, this book is really awesome. The overuse/addictive power of opiates is one of the reasons I don't take them. Plus, they don't really do anything for nerve pain in my body.
pickI read way more in January than I thought!
I can't recommend Dreamland enough, but American Pain was truly a great follow up for it. It blows my mind that two juice heads with no business or medical background were able to open and operate Florida's biggest pain clinic and have such an impact on the opiate epidemic. I listened to it on audio, and my only complaint was the narrator - he was a bit underwhelming. #readjanuary #bestofjanuary
Best of January! Great start to 2017. My goal of starting graphic novels is working. 😃👍🏻 #NonfictionChallenge17
pick5⭐️ A must-read if you want to understand the relationship between Florida pain clinics and Appalachian deaths. I loved the OxyContin Express documentary, and this went so much further in explaining the issues through the lens of the largest clinic. Excellent narration on the #audiobook #NonfictionChallenge17
Sorry I haven't been on today. I passed out in my recliner! My neck is paying. 🤣🤣🤣
Just picked this up from #audible. My library didn't have it. I love this topic, so I'm excited. This is definitely a #blameitonlitsy purchase! (And of course I need to start a fourth audiobook. 😉😉)
#lastbookstacked #seasonsreadings2016 #blameitALLonlitsy 😃😉😘
I've learned about so many great books here! Thank you all! Each of you are my #favelittens 💕💕💕 I've loved seeing everyone's recent adds today.
Shout out to @Ambrosnazzy for the rec!
Yesterday I was drawn towards learning more about the opioid addiction epidemic. #seasonsreadings2016 #lastbookstacked
pickThis is a tough read because this has taken place right in my backyard. Opioids (and now heroin) have taken too many lives, including people I grew up with, and reading about how a very prolific pill mill came to be, was infuriating. But I think it's a good book and gives an insight into the very real problem of addiction. 4🌟
Dropped hubby and baby off at the airport and now I'm kicking off the few days of freedom I have before I fly to NY for Christmas, with some pool-side reading. Nothing says Christmas time quite like 90 degree heat 😖
In addition to picking up Witness to the Revolution, I also snapped these up at the library. I had told myself that I was only going to the library to drop off my loans & would walk right out so I could start reading from my personal library. That worked out really well 😅😅😅😅 in my defense, all 3 books were already on my TBR list.
so-soDavid Kessler's "A Question of Intent" is my gold standard for exploratory non-fiction; this book doesn't compare. Instead of exposing the larger pill mill epidemic, this book is about one man and his role in a shady business. Verdict: Interesting story; rating downgrade for annoying narration.
A quote from Palahniuk which this book bought to mind
pickOkay this book was fascinating and raised some real issues. As I previously commented documents the rise and fall of the American Pain Clinic a Florida pill house dedicated to the dispensing of opioids. Although its operations were legal in the strictest definition they were eventually bought low by Rico laws. The final question from one of the defendants remains in my head - why did the government let us do it in the first place? Why would they
Half way through this and all I can say is wow; highly addictive prescription painkillers, capitalism and a ready demand from poorer states during the economic downturn leading to the rise of the pain clinic phenomenon, where drugs were dispensed with no care except ability to pay. This book is opening my eyes to an element of American Society of which I was unaware.
