Patrick Radden Keefe

The highly anticipated portrait of three generations of the Sackler family, by the prize-winning, bestselling author of SAY NOTHING The Sackler name adorns 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 sciences. The source of the family fortune was vague, however, until it emerged that the Sacklers were responsible for making and marketing Oxycontin, a blockbuster painkiller that was a catalyst for the opioid crisis. Empire of Pain is a masterpiece of narrative reporting and writing, exhaustively documented and ferociously compelling.

The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty

Empire of Pain

oberon vortigern

It is a peculiar hallmark of the American economy that you can produce a dangerous product and effectively off-load any legal liability for whatever destruction that product may cause by pointing to the individual responsibility of the consumer.

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, as featured in the HBO documentary Crime of the Century. The Sackler name adorns 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. 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. 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.

More brilliant writing from PRK, one of the best journalists writing long form work today. For a survey of a corrupt family that spans three generations and takes place, at least in the later half of the book, in the minutiae of patent law and email chains, it’s a remarkably compelling read, especially after seeing All The Beauty And The Bloodshed. 

Christopher Malarick

Liz B

Absolutely fascinating (and sickening at times) look into the Sacklers & into Purdue. PRK brilliantly traces the Sacklers' involvement in the opioid crisis today all the way back through three generations, where you can see the seeds planted along the way that led to the national opioid crisis and moral failings of the family today. I recommend listening to it on audiobook as well.

Cindy Lieberman

Gobsmacked! I listened to this with my mouth agape in disbelief. The greed, self-delusion, the playing whilst Rome is burning….just incredible. not just the Sacklers, but also the complicit FDA and advertising execs, doctors and pseudo-researchers… you’ve got to read/listen to truly understand the depth of corruption that hastened the opioid crisis. Interesting parallels to Big Tobacco but at warp speed. Don’t miss this one!

'Put simply, this book will make your blood boil . . . Keefe . . . paints a devastating portrait of a family consumed by greed and unwilling to take the slightest responsibility or show the least sympathy for what it wrought.' John Carreyrou, author of Bad Blood, in the New York Times The gripping and shocking story of three generations of the Sackler family and their roles in the stories of Valium and Oxycontin, by the prize-winning, bestselling author of Say Nothing. The Sackler name adorns 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 in 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 Oxycontin, a blockbuster painkiller that was a catalyst for the opioid crisis-an international epidemic of drug addiction which has killed nearly half a million people. In this masterpiece of narrative reporting and writing, Patrick Radden Keefe exhaustively documents the jaw-dropping and ferociously compelling reality. Empire of Pain is the story of a dynasty: a parable of 21st century greed.

I don’t think I have ever been more revolted by the human species than in this book. It further disgusts me that none of The Sacklers are behind bars right now. 

This is my first book by Patrick Keefe, and it will not be the last. This book was nothing short of exceptional; investigative reporting meets fictional prose to create this eerie, family God-father like saga. 

To further illustrate my reading experience, I went ahead and also watched Dopesick. The cast is stellar, with Michael Stuhlbarg in specific portraying an uncanny Richard Sackler. While the book with the same name goes into the more human consequences of the Oxycontin, shedding a spotlight on particular cases inspired by real life addicts who have been hideously misled by Purdue, Empire of Pain is different.

If you’re like me with an interest to know: How did this happen? Where did the Sacklers come from? How did they get away with it? How was this all legal? Then this book is perfect for you. And when I tell you Keefe is meticulous, he leaves NOTHING out. 

Do I recommend? Yes, it’s lengthy and will require your attention but its so easy to get sucked into.

Jawahir M

I don’t think I have ever been more revolted by the human species than in this book. It further disgusts me that none of The Sacklers are behind bars right now. 

This is my first book by Patrick Keefe, and it will not be the last. This book was nothing short of exceptional; investigative reporting meets fictional prose to create this eerie, family God-father like saga. 

To further illustrate my reading experience, I went ahead and also watched Dopesick. The cast is stellar, with Michael Stuhlbarg in specific portraying an uncanny Richard Sackler. While the book with the same name goes into the more human consequences of the Oxycontin, shedding a spotlight on particular cases inspired by real life addicts who have been hideously misled by Purdue, Empire of Pain is different.

If you’re like me with an interest to know: How did this happen? Where did the Sacklers come from? How did they get away with it? How was this all legal? Then this book is perfect for you. And when I tell you Keefe is meticulous, he leaves NOTHING out. 

Do I recommend? Yes, it’s lengthy and will require your attention but its so easy to get sucked into.



Shangbing jiang

alina s

Ethan Hill

I said I would finish this today and I did!

Ok, in all seriousness this is a SUPER impressive piece of narrative nonfiction. A few years ago I saw John Oliver's segment on the Sackler family and decided to do a few google searches myself. This family has done a great job at having close to zero presence anywhere. Keefe manages to create a rich family saga with little more than court documents and personal testimony from individuals too scared to go on the record. An absolutely essential look at one of the most pressing crisis's facing our country today that manages to never lose sight of the story it wants to tell even as the various threads threaten to unravel. Very excited to read Say Nothing now.

i am a firm believer that we should all be in an ethics class, at least one semester in our lives, but ten ethics courses could not fix these people.

patrick radden keefe has been incredibly thorough in building a compelling and riveting record of the sackler dynasty. the book is both maddening and - excuse the use of the word - addictive.

that being said, i think the audiobook format is the way to go as it is quite rich in detail which may be sometimes overwhelming in print format.

bhargavi

Everyone should definitely read Empire of Pain if you want to be enraged, education, and engrossed. 

Empire of Pain is an unrelenting look at the role the Sackler family has played in the growing opioid crisis in America. While the book is rife with facts and research, with separate sections detailing the Sackler's descent into power and wealth, it doesn't fail to pull emotion out of the reader as well. The writing is phenomenal, yes, but the emotion that resonated with me the most while reading this book was rage. If you want a light non-fiction read, or want something that will be easy, this is not the book for you. Keefe takes the reader through the heartbreaking history of the opioid crisis, and the blatant, cruel, and malicious actions on the part of the Sackler family. It's not enough to say they were compliant in creating the crisis, because without them, the crisis wouldn't have been possible to the level it was. While I believe everyone needs to read this book to be properly aware of their role in the worst epidemic the United States has seen in recent decades, I caution all readers that it did make me angry, rightfully so, many times over the course of the book. 

Despite the Sackler family's abhorrant actions, however, Keefe never turns them into larger than life or cartoonishly evil characters. His writing is so comprehensive and detailed that we can see how incrementally the Sacklers built the empire that would allow them to take control of the opioid marketplace to such a massive degree with their release of OxyContin in the 1990s. Keefe's book starts decades prior, and slowly but effectively weaves the path the Sackler's built, making sure to spend time on famous places that bear the Sackler name, such as the Met. While such comprehensive writing may seem boring, Keefe masterfully treads the line between informative and inundation, allowing the reader to comprehend how each of the actions taken by the Sackler family fits into a larger plan. 

Keefe's writing is nonfiction that reads like fiction, repeatedly harkening back to themes and concepts he touches on numerous times throughout his novel. Using this narrative approach, Keefe allows the reader to put together the pieces of understanding the Sackler family and Purdue Pharma's role in the opioid crisis without spelling it out to readers, making for a much more grim and satisfying understanding. The book jumps between the actions of individual Sackler family members (including the actions of their wives and children) and the repercussions their company has on the American public and their workers, with many employees at Purdue Pharma appearing to drive the point him. Through this cast of characters, Keefe shows not only how the Sacklers created a cult of personality within their company, amplifying the corporate culture that would allow them to manufacture and sell OxyContin to Americans the way they did, but he also shows how every decision regarding OxyContin was made by the Sacklers to benefit them. By expanding the scope of his investigation beyond the opioid crisis and the Sackler role primarily in pharma, and taking a more holistic approach, Keefe does something not yet done: he shows how only the Sacklers, really, could have created this crisis. The reader slowly comes to understand how monumental the role of the Sacklers was in creating the crisis, and thus, his book has done his job. 

Along with heartbreaking stories of addicts who have lost their lives to the drug, the family they leave behind, and the "legacy" of the Sackler family, Keefe's book is a testament to the recent public reckoning that has been recurring in regards to the opioid crisis, and reminds us that the real villains are often hiding in plain sight.

Jenna

Caitlyn Baldwin

Patrick Radden Keefe once again hits it out of the park with this thoroughly researched and engaging account on the family behind Oxycontin and their part in the opiate epidemic.

Francis Buggey

i am so disgusted and sad about this. the fact that one family’s selfish interests have led to the opioid epidemic (which isn’t ending anytime soon) is absolutely mind blowing

Kate Standing 

I found Empire of Pain to be such an accessible and eye opening look into the opioid epidemic. Starting with the life of Arthur Sackler and his brothers, and ending in the current day it gave great depth without being too dry. 

Flavia Louise

Ok so I knew I would never get to this if I only had access to the ebook and I only have Scribd until the 18th. So yes I binged this 18 hour audiobook in 2 days and like 3 or 4 sittings. 
So storytime done.
I really liked this book. I mean not what the people in it did. But the framing and the writing style really worked for me. This is obviously not a book for everyone but if you care about medicine and its impact on society: Read it.

Nadine 

A painful read as Keefe uncovers the history of the opioid crisis and the people that made it possible. The incredible callousness and what money and power can afford them in terms of immunity and protection of their wealth is just incredible. 
Luckily the tide seems to have turned somewhat and their money seems to no longer buy them the prestige they crave. 
If only the victims and their families could get their hands on the money plundered from the companies...

Danai koftori

Patrick Radden Keefe is one of the best investigative journalists of our time and he proves it again in this book. The books is a detailed account of the origins of the Sacklers's wealth and their role in the opioid crisis. It's the story of a family that cared too much for its name and money and wanted to be knows as philanthropists but we're anything but. I can't praise this book enough - it is an illuminating read.

Rowan Eva

An excellent and unbelievable story, really. But definitely not a satisfying ending.

Emma Jacqueline

Scarier than anything Stephen King has ever written.

Deborah Kerr

Aaron Bach

An unbelievable story of a family’s monumental greed and the way it destroyed millions of lives. Highly worth the read.

Maytal

This was my first time listening to an audiobook, and I really enjoyed it. Well, as much as you can enjoy being endlessly shocked by greed and evil in this world.

A morbidly compelling tale of ambition, greed and destruction. Horrifying on a thousand levels. 

Empire of Pain The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty

Reviews

Highlights