Reviews tagging 'Grief'

Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty by Patrick Radden Keefe

22 reviews

hilaryreadsbooks's review against another edition

5.0

[Thank you Anchor Books for the gifted copy] 

Many of us know that powerful people are capable of terrible things, but many of us do not know what those terrible things often are. Patrick Radden Keefe’s EMPIRE OF PAIN: THE SECRET HISTORY OF THE SACKLER DYNASTY is an incredible tome of research and investigation that exposes just a part of this terrible world. Focused less on the actual opioid epidemic, EMPIRE OF PAIN hones in on this powerful family and how greed, ambition, and power led to this crisis. Keefe writes with empathy and clarity, and his storytelling, as it was with SAY NOTHING, was phenomenal. Even at 500 pages, I finished this book in just two nights. 

What stood out to me the most was the Sackler family and Purdue Pharma’s manipulation of pain patients (and I appreciate Keefe’s note at the end explaining his intention to not contribute to stigmatization of those who use opioids, but rather to demonstrate that the Sacklers and Purdue “have for decades invoked the interests of pain patients as a fig leaf for their own avarice.” The facts that Keefe presents behind this are sobering—there were multiple instances where the Sacklers and other Purdue executives ignored addiction data that foresaw the crisis; instead, they would deny any links and continue to sell Oxy, even using pain patients as examples of Oxy’s effectiveness in their ads. There was, as well, Purdue Pharma’s intention to start selling addiction treatment drugs that target the very market of addiction they created (a business model used by many big pharma companies). 

EMPIRE OF PAIN will stay with me for a long time. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Drug use, Drug abuse, Grief, Medical trauma, and Death

Moderate: Suicide and Self harm

____emily____'s review against another edition

informative reflective sad medium-paced

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Addiction, and Drug abuse

Moderate: Antisemitism, Classism, Grief, and Death

Minor: Suicide and Mental illness

megang519's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness, Grief, Infidelity, Addiction, Drug abuse, Drug use, and Death

Moderate: Cancer and Chronic illness

Minor: Suicide attempt, Antisemitism, Suicide, and Schizophrenia/Psychosis

internationalreads's review against another edition

challenging dark informative sad tense fast-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Child death, Classism, Death, Death of parent, Drug abuse, Drug use, Grief, and Suicide

darkcornerofthelibrary's review against another edition

dark informative medium-paced

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug abuse, Drug use, and Addiction

Minor: Child death, Suicide, and Grief

emilybaum's review against another edition

dark informative reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Drug abuse and Gaslighting

Minor: Grief

citrinuke's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative reflective medium-paced

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, and Medical content

Moderate: Death of parent, Grief, and Suicide

mscalls's review against another edition

challenging informative reflective tense fast-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Antisemitism, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Grief, and Medical content

caseythereader's review

challenging dark emotional informative sad slow-paced

5.0

 - Pretty sure no one needs my endorsement to pick up EMPIRE OF PAIN at this point, but here it is. I don't read a ton of heavily reported nonfiction, but this is one you can't miss.
- Keefe is so good at discussing complicated people and topics in a conversational, easy to follow way.
- Even if you already know the basics of this story from news reports or other books like DOPESICK, I'm willing to bet there are still anecdotes in this book about the callousness of the people involved that will shock you. You think you know how greedy people can be, and yet.
- Also, this is a sort of irrelevant side note, but if this was fiction I would have dinged the author for seemingly transparently lifting Richard Sackler's personality from the characters in THE SECRET HISTORY, haha. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Antisemitism, Child death, Chronic illness, Confinement, Death, Death of parent, Drug abuse, Drug use, Forced institutionalization, Grief, Infidelity, Medical content, Suicide, and Suicide attempt

kasey_reads's review against another edition

dark emotional tense medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug abuse, Drug use, and Addiction

Moderate: Grief

Minor: Suicide and Antisemitism