We look forward to seeing you on your next visit to the library. Find a location near you.

Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty
(OverDrive MP3 Audiobook, OverDrive Listen)

Book Cover
Average Rating
5 star
 
(3)
4 star
 
(1)
3 star
 
(1)
2 star
 
(0)
1 star
 
(1)
Published:
Books on Tape 2021
Status:
Checked Out
Description
NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE NOMINEE A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR • NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER • A grand, devastating portrait of three generations of the Sackler family, famed for their philanthropy, whose fortune was built by Valium and whose reputation was destroyed by OxyContin. From the prize-winning and bestselling author of Say Nothing

The history of the Sackler dynasty is rife with drama—baroque personal lives; bitter disputes over estates; fistfights in boardrooms; glittering art collections; Machiavellian courtroom maneuvers; and the calculated use of money to burnish reputations and crush the less powerful. The Sackler name has adorned the walls of many storied institutions—Harvard, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Oxford, the Louvre. They are one of the richest families in the world, known for their lavish donations to the arts and the sciences. The source of the family fortune was vague, however, until it emerged that the Sacklers were responsible for making and marketing a blockbuster painkiller that was the catalyst for the opioid crisis.

Empire of Pain
begins with the story of three doctor brothers, Raymond, Mortimer and the incalculably energetic Arthur, who weathered the poverty of the Great Depression and appalling anti-Semitism. Working at a barbaric mental institution, Arthur saw a better way and conducted groundbreaking research into drug treatments. He also had a genius for marketing, especially for pharmaceuticals, and bought a small ad firm.
Arthur devised the marketing for Valium, and built the first great Sackler fortune. He purchased a drug manufacturer, Purdue Frederick, which would be run by Raymond and Mortimer. The brothers began collecting art, and wives, and grand residences in exotic locales. Their children and grandchildren grew up in luxury.
Forty years later, Raymond’s son Richard ran the family-owned Purdue. The template Arthur Sackler created to sell Valium—co-opting doctors, influencing the FDA, downplaying the drug’s addictiveness—was employed to launch a far more potent product: OxyContin. The drug went on to generate some thirty-five billion dollars in revenue, and to launch a public health crisis in which hundreds of thousands would die.
This is the saga of three generations of a single family and the mark they would leave on the world, a tale that moves from the bustling streets of early twentieth-century Brooklyn to the seaside palaces of Greenwich, Connecticut, and Cap d’Antibes to the corridors of power in Washington, D.C.  Empire of Pain chronicles the multiple investigations of the Sacklers and their company, and the scorched-earth legal tactics that the family has used to evade accountability. 

Empire of Pain
is a masterpiece of narrative reporting and writing, exhaustively documented and ferociously compelling. It is a portrait of the excesses of America’s second Gilded Age, a study of impunity among the super elite and a relentless investigation of the naked greed and indifference to human suffering that built one of the world’s great fortunes.
Also in This Series
Formats
OverDrive MP3 Audiobook
Works on MP3 Players, PCs, and Macs. Some mobile devices may require an application to be installed.
OverDrive Listen
Need Help?
If you are having problem transferring a title to your device, please fill out this support form or visit the library so we can help you to use our eBooks and eAudio Books.
More Like This
Other Editions and Formats
More Copies In LINK+
Loading LINK+ Copies...
More Details
Format:
OverDrive MP3 Audiobook, OverDrive Listen
Edition:
Unabridged
Street Date:
04/13/2021
Language:
English
ISBN:
9780593162408
Reviews from GoodReads
Loading GoodReads Reviews.
Citations
APA Citation (style guide)

Patrick Radden Keefe. (2021). Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty. Unabridged Books on Tape.

Chicago / Turabian - Author Date Citation (style guide)

Patrick Radden Keefe. 2021. Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty. Books on Tape.

Chicago / Turabian - Humanities Citation (style guide)

Patrick Radden Keefe, Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty. Books on Tape, 2021.

MLA Citation (style guide)

Patrick Radden Keefe. Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty. Unabridged Books on Tape, 2021.

Note! Citation formats are based on standards as of July 2022. Citations contain only title, author, edition, publisher, and year published. Citations should be used as a guideline and should be double checked for accuracy.
Copy Details
LibraryOwnedAvailable
Shared Digital Collection70

There are 34 holds on this title.

Staff View
Grouped Work ID:
64d2f619-7669-7eab-f12c-c96bf6136898
Go To Grouped Work
Needs Update?:
No
Date Added:
Apr 09, 2021 18:10:27
Date Updated:
Apr 09, 2021 18:10:27
Last Metadata Check:
Mar 28, 2024 13:34:56
Last Metadata Change:
Mar 24, 2024 15:07:36
Last Availability Check:
Mar 28, 2024 13:34:58
Last Availability Change:
Mar 27, 2024 00:33:09
Last Grouped Work Modification Time:
Mar 29, 2024 02:17:20

OverDrive Product Record

images
    • cover:
        • href: https://img1.od-cdn.com/ImageType-100/1191-1/{A83E809F-878D-4239-8D4F-3D8B223ECF03}Img100.jpg
        • type: image/jpeg
    • thumbnail:
        • href: https://img1.od-cdn.com/ImageType-200/1191-1/{A83E809F-878D-4239-8D4F-3D8B223ECF03}Img200.jpg
        • type: image/jpeg
    • cover150Wide:
        • href: https://img1.od-cdn.com/ImageType-150/1191-1/A83/E80/9F/{A83E809F-878D-4239-8D4F-3D8B223ECF03}Img150.jpg
        • type: image/jpeg
    • cover300Wide:
        • href: https://img1.od-cdn.com/ImageType-400/1191-1/A83/E80/9F/{A83E809F-878D-4239-8D4F-3D8B223ECF03}Img400.jpg
        • type: image/jpeg
formats
      • identifiers:
            • type: ISBN
            • value: 9780593162408
      • name: OverDrive MP3 Audiobook
      • id: audiobook-mp3
      • identifiers:
            • type: ISBN
            • value: 9780593162408
      • name: OverDrive Listen
      • id: audiobook-overdrive
mediaType
Audiobook
primaryCreator
    • role: Author
    • name: Patrick Radden Keefe
title
Empire of Pain
dateAdded
2021-04-09T19:40:00-04:00
contentDetails
      • href: https://link.overdrive.com/?websiteID=141&titleID=5851743
      • type: text/html
      • account:
          • name: Sacramento Public Library (CA)
          • id: 1151
sortTitle
Empire of Pain The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty
crossRefId
5851743
subtitle
The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty
id
a83e809f-878d-4239-8d4f-3d8b223ecf03
starRating
0

OverDrive MetaData

isPublicDomain
False
formats
      • duration: 18:17:44
      • fileName: EmpireofPain_9780593162392_5851743
      • partCount: 19
      • fileSize: 521794288
      • identifiers:
            • type: ISBN
            • value: 9780593162408
      • rights:
            • type: PlayOnPC
            • value: 1
            • type: PlayOnPCCount
            • value: -1
            • type: BurnToCD
            • value: 1
            • type: BurnToCDCount
            • value: -1
            • type: PlayOnPM
            • value: 1
            • type: TransferToSDMI
            • value: 1
            • type: TransferToNonSDMI
            • value: 1
            • type: TransferCount
            • value: -1
            • type: CollaborativePlay
            • value: 0
            • type: PublicPerformance
            • value: 0
            • type: TranscodeToAAC
            • value: 1
      • name: OverDrive MP3 Audiobook
      • isReadAlong: False
      • id: audiobook-mp3
      • onSaleDate: 4/13/2021
      • samples:
            • source: Part 1
            • formatType: audiobook-overdrive
            • url: https://samples.overdrive.com/?crid=a83e809f-878d-4239-8d4f-3d8b223ecf03&.epub-sample.overdrive.com
      • duration: 18:06:55
      • fileName: OverDrive_15688
      • partCount: 0
      • fileSize: 521720677
      • identifiers:
            • type: ISBN
            • value: 9780593162408
      • name: OverDrive Listen
      • isReadAlong: False
      • id: audiobook-overdrive
      • onSaleDate: 4/13/2021
      • samples:
            • source: Part 1
            • formatType: audiobook-overdrive
            • url: https://samples.overdrive.com/?crid=a83e809f-878d-4239-8d4f-3d8b223ecf03&.epub-sample.overdrive.com
creators
      • role: Author
      • fileAs: Keefe, Patrick Radden
      • bioText: PATRICK RADDEN KEEFE is a staff writer at The New Yorker and the author, most recently, of the New York Times bestseller Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland, which received the National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction, was selected as one of the ten best books of 2019 by The New York Times Book Review, The Washington Post, Chicago Tribune and The Wall Street Journal, and was named one of the top ten nonfiction books of the decade by Entertainment Weekly. His previous books are The Snakehead and Chatter. His work has been recognized with a Guggenheim Fellowship, the National Magazine Award for Feature Writing and the Orwell Prize for Political Writing. He is also the creator and host of the eight-part podcast Wind of Change.
      • name: Patrick Radden Keefe
      • role: Narrator
      • fileAs: Keefe, Patrick Radden
      • bioText: PATRICK RADDEN KEEFE is a staff writer at The New Yorker and the author, most recently, of the New York Times bestseller Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland, which received the National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction, was selected as one of the ten best books of 2019 by The New York Times Book Review, The Washington Post, Chicago Tribune and The Wall Street Journal, and was named one of the top ten nonfiction books of the decade by Entertainment Weekly. His previous books are The Snakehead and Chatter. His work has been recognized with a Guggenheim Fellowship, the National Magazine Award for Feature Writing and the Orwell Prize for Political Writing. He is also the creator and host of the eight-part podcast Wind of Change.
      • name: Patrick Radden Keefe
imprint
Random House Audio
publishDate
2021-04-13T00:00:00-04:00
edition
Unabridged
isOwnedByCollections
True
title
Empire of Pain
fullDescription
NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE NOMINEE A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR • NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER • A grand, devastating portrait of three generations of the Sackler family, famed for their philanthropy, whose fortune was built by Valium and whose reputation was destroyed by OxyContin. From the prize-winning and bestselling author of Say Nothing

The history of the Sackler dynasty is rife with drama—baroque personal lives; bitter disputes over estates; fistfights in boardrooms; glittering art collections; Machiavellian courtroom maneuvers; and the calculated use of money to burnish reputations and crush the less powerful. The Sackler name has adorned the walls of many storied institutions—Harvard, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Oxford, the Louvre. They are one of the richest families in the world, known for their lavish donations to the arts and the sciences. The source of the family fortune was vague, however, until it emerged that the Sacklers were responsible for making and marketing a blockbuster painkiller that was the catalyst for the opioid crisis.

Empire of Pain
begins with the story of three doctor brothers, Raymond, Mortimer and the incalculably energetic Arthur, who weathered the poverty of the Great Depression and appalling anti-Semitism. Working at a barbaric mental institution, Arthur saw a better way and conducted groundbreaking research into drug treatments. He also had a genius for marketing, especially for pharmaceuticals, and bought a small ad firm.
Arthur devised the marketing for Valium, and built the first great Sackler fortune. He purchased a drug manufacturer, Purdue Frederick, which would be run by Raymond and Mortimer. The brothers began collecting art, and wives, and grand residences in exotic locales. Their children and grandchildren grew up in luxury.
Forty years later, Raymond’s son Richard ran the family-owned Purdue. The template Arthur Sackler created to sell Valium—co-opting doctors, influencing the FDA, downplaying the drug’s addictiveness—was employed to launch a far more potent product: OxyContin. The drug went on to generate some thirty-five billion dollars in revenue, and to launch a public health crisis in which hundreds of thousands would die.
This is the saga of three generations of a single family and the mark they would leave on the world, a tale that moves from the bustling streets of early twentieth-century Brooklyn to the seaside palaces of Greenwich, Connecticut, and Cap d’Antibes to the corridors of power in Washington, D.C.  Empire of Pain chronicles the multiple investigations of the Sacklers and their company, and the scorched-earth legal tactics that the family has used to evade accountability. 

Empire of Pain
is a masterpiece of narrative reporting and writing, exhaustively documented and ferociously compelling. It is a portrait of the excesses of America’s second Gilded Age, a study of impunity among the super elite and a relentless investigation of the naked greed and indifference to human suffering that built one of the world’s great fortunes.
popularity
17867
links
    • self:
        • href: https://api.overdrive.com/v1/collections/v1L1B3gEAAA2d/products/a83e809f-878d-4239-8d4f-3d8b223ecf03/metadata
        • type: application/vnd.overdrive.api+json
id
a83e809f-878d-4239-8d4f-3d8b223ecf03
starRating
4.3
images
    • cover:
        • href: https://img1.od-cdn.com/ImageType-100/1191-1/{A83E809F-878D-4239-8D4F-3D8B223ECF03}Img100.jpg
        • type: image/jpeg
    • thumbnail:
        • href: https://img1.od-cdn.com/ImageType-200/1191-1/{A83E809F-878D-4239-8D4F-3D8B223ECF03}Img200.jpg
        • type: image/jpeg
    • cover150Wide:
        • href: https://img1.od-cdn.com/ImageType-150/1191-1/A83/E80/9F/{A83E809F-878D-4239-8D4F-3D8B223ECF03}Img150.jpg
        • type: image/jpeg
    • cover300Wide:
        • href: https://img1.od-cdn.com/ImageType-400/1191-1/A83/E80/9F/{A83E809F-878D-4239-8D4F-3D8B223ECF03}Img400.jpg
        • type: image/jpeg
isPublicPerformanceAllowed
False
languages
      • code: en
      • name: English
subjects
      • value: Biography & Autobiography
      • value: Business
      • value: True Crime
      • value: Nonfiction
publishDateText
04/13/2021
mediaType
Audiobook
shortDescription
NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE NOMINEE A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR • NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER • A grand, devastating portrait of three generations of the Sackler family, famed for their philanthropy, whose fortune was built by Valium and whose reputation was destroyed by OxyContin. From the prize-winning and bestselling author of Say Nothing

The history of the Sackler dynasty is rife with drama—baroque personal lives; bitter disputes over estates; fistfights in boardrooms; glittering art collections; Machiavellian courtroom maneuvers; and the calculated use of money to burnish reputations and crush the less powerful. The Sackler name has adorned the walls of many storied institutions—Harvard, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Oxford, the Louvre. They are one of the richest families in the world, known for their lavish donations to the arts and the sciences. The source of the family...
sortTitle
Empire of Pain The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty
crossRefId
5851743
awards
      • source: The National Book Critics Circle
      • value: National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist
      • source: Notable Books Council
      • value: Notable Books for Adults
subtitle
The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty
publisher
Books on Tape
bisacCodes
      • code: BIO013000
      • description: Biography & Autobiography / Rich & Famous
      • code: BUS070130
      • description: Business & Economics / Industries / Pharmaceutical & Biotechnology
      • code: TRU005000
      • description: True Crime / White Collar Crime