American Pain

Fascinating. . . . thoroughly reported. . . . American Pain offers a window into America's drug-addiction epidemic. * The Washington Post * (Starred Review). . . . [An] exhilarating blow-by-blow account. . . . Journalism professor Temple dissects the . . . criminal operation and documents the rise and fall of American Pain with precision and authority in this highly readable true crime account. * Publishers Weekly * John Temple's American Pain takes you on a hysterically funny, yet equally tragic, tour of Florida's pill mill industry as the painkiller epidemic was reaching a fever pitch.... a must-read for anyone trying to understand this government-sanctioned drug and the destructive power of Big Pharma. -Melisa Wallack, Oscar-nominated co-writer of Dallas Buyers Club American Pain made me angrier with every page. Why? Because John Temple has so adeptly reported this story of how a handful of criminals and shady doctors in Florida profited from the poverty and addiction of the Appalachian South. -James Higdon, national bestselling author of The Cornbread Mafia: A Homegrown Syndicate's Code of Silence and the Biggest Marijuana Bust in American History John Temple's American Pain is as addicting a read as the little pills he writes about. Temple details the brazen operations of some of America's largest pill mills and how they thrived in plain sight for years before the government took action. -Jason Ryan, author of Jackpot: High Times, High Seas, and the Sting That Launched the War on Drugs In his masterful nonfiction book American Pain, John Temple lays bare the perfect storm of lax regulation, aggressive marketing, greed, and addiction that created an opioid epidemic. .. .Temple's writing is propulsive * Foreword Magazine *