
American Pain
How a Young Felon and His Ring of Doctors Unleashed America's Deadliest Drug Epidemic
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Narrated by:
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Charlie Thurston
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By:
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John Temple
About this listen
The king of the Florida pill mills was American Pain, a megaclinic expressly created to serve addicts posing as patients. From a fortresslike former bank building, American Pain's doctors distributed massive quantities of oxycodone to hundreds of customers a day, mostly traffickers and addicts who came by the vanload. Inked muscleheads ran the clinic's security. Former strippers operated the pharmacy, counting out pills and stashing cash in garbage bags. Under their lab coats, the doctors carried guns, and it was all legal...sort of.
American Pain chronicles the rise and fall of this game-changing pill mill and how it helped tip the nation into its current opioid crisis. The narrative, which swings back and forth between Florida and Kentucky, is populated by a diverse cast of characters. This includes the incongruous band of wealthy bad boys, thugs, and esteemed physicians who built American Pain as well as the penniless Kentucky clans who transformed themselves into painkiller trafficking rings. It includes addicts whose lives were devastated by American Pain's drugs and the federal agents and grieving mothers who labored for years to bring the clinic's crew to justice.
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The Pale-Faced Lie
- A True Story
- By: David Crow
- Narrated by: Kaipo Schwab
- Length: 11 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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Growing up on the Navajo Indian Reservation, David Crow and his siblings idolized their dad. Tall, strong, smart, and brave, the self-taught Cherokee regaled his family with stories of his World War II feats. But as time passed, David discovered the other side of Thurston Crow, the ex-con with his own code of ethics that justified cruelty, violence, lies - even murder. A shrewd con artist with a genius IQ, Thurston intimidated David with beatings to coerce him into doing his criminal bidding. David's mom, too mentally ill to care for her children, couldn't protect him.
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Best new release I’ve read!
- By A. Deal on 02-17-20
By: David Crow
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The Demon Next Door
- By: Bryan Burrough
- Narrated by: Steve White
- Length: 2 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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Best-selling author Bryan Burrough recently made a shocking discovery: The small town of Temple, Texas, where he had grown up, had harbored a dark secret. One of his high school classmates, Danny Corwin, was a vicious serial killer. In this chilling tale, Burrough raises important questions of whether serial killers can be recognized before they kill or rehabilitated after they do. It is also a story of Texas politics and power that led the good citizens of the town of Temple to enable a demon who was their worst nightmare.
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Odd narration choice
- By Amanda Fredericks on 03-08-19
By: Bryan Burrough
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Quackery
- A Brief History of the Worst Ways to Cure Everything
- By: Lydia Kang, Nate Pedersen
- Narrated by: Hillary Huber
- Length: 10 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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What won't we try in our quest for perfect health, beauty, and the fountain of youth? Well, just imagine a time when doctors prescribed morphine for crying infants. When liquefied gold was touted as immortality in a glass. And when strychnine - yes, that strychnine, the one used in rat poison - was dosed like Viagra. Looking back with fascination, horror, and not a little dash of dark, knowing humor, Quackery recounts the lively, at times unbelievable, history of medical misfires and malpractices.
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Computer-generated Narrator. Dated Humour.
- By Nemo on 12-28-18
By: Lydia Kang, and others
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The Warsaw Orphan
- By: Kelly Rimmer
- Narrated by: Nancy Peterson, Charlie Thurston
- Length: 13 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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In the spring of 1942, young Elzbieta Rabinek is aware of the swiftly growing discord just beyond the courtyard of her comfortable Warsaw home. She has no fondness for the Germans who patrol her streets and impose their curfews, but has never given much thought to what goes on behind the walls that contain her Jewish neighbors. She knows all too well about German brutality - and that it's the reason she must conceal her true identity. But in befriending Sara, Elzbieta makes a discovery that propels her into a dangerous world of deception and heroism.
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Kelly did it again! 🥰
- By Eric Cardoza on 07-21-21
By: Kelly Rimmer
The second thing of note is that the 'vignette' stories chosen to demonstrate just how bad this Oxy issue is were a bit scattered, or perhaps the better word is thin... the author spent 80% of the book looking at the main characters and their drug marketing process but the 20% which looked at (real) people's issues with the drug, or the company, seemed randomly inserted. Sure, they were interesting, but the flow was not really logical - we read 4 chapters about the business, then a vignette chapter about an addict dying from a drug overdose, then 2 chapters of business, then a chapter with another set of characters drug addiction, etc. There didn't seem to be a pattern, unless it was meant to be a time-scale thing, but that was not clear.
I did, however, Google this organization when I finished the book and it seems the story was based on real characters, and real addicts, so perhaps the weird addition of certain addicts' details was because those were the ones whose information was public due to lawsuits, or whatever... and the rest of the addicts' story were just a conglomeration of stories blended together.
Anyway, all that being said, I couldn't put the book down. I don't understand how they were allowed to run this business this way, and/or why they had to go so far with it that they got arrested... because until some (unclear) tipping point, what they were doing was legal (which is sad in and of itself). Though I suppose once you start making so much money each day that you have to put it into garbage cans, you might realize you probably crossed a line somewhere.
The narration is fine. There is no graphic content but, of course, the material discusses drugs and drug addiction.
Worst part is that it was almost legal
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the streets all involved got off light especially the so called doctors.
Eye opening book
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If you could sum up American Pain in three words, what would they be?
A great storyWhat did you like best about this story?
The author paced the story perfectly; providing just enough detail and clarity, without ever getting bogged down in one part of the story. He drew all of it together seamlessly. This book was very well written. The author knows how to tell a story and did so effectively here.What about Charlie Thurston’s performance did you like?
He inconsistently used accents for some of the characters involved in the story, and it was unintentionally hilarious. Yet, at the same time, I think it may have added to the story. He did a solid job overall. I enjoyed his performance.Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?
It was a tragic story that never should have happened. All of the participants in the pain clinics clearly have some culpability. But the real villian in this story is the State of Florida who inexplicably allowed clinics like this to exist in the first place.Any additional comments?
The author did a fantastic job telling the story.Outstanding
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Amazing!
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This story made me angry.
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Inspirational
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I had no idea this happened.
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Couldn't stop listening
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American Pain enabled callous greed
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listen again. Sadly enough, a true snapshot of American History. I despise the entrepreneurs. What worthless slime. Assembled in the tragic hell of Florida. Jesus God. It’s so ugly. Be glad, those whom were never even close to this evil. F these guys. And sad pity upon their prey. Yeah, don your polyester wide collars, Mercedes, meaningless futile predatory existence and worthless presence. F You. F You. Just die.
Great book no weak points
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