May Book Club

Note: All the upcoming books and those that we didn’t select in the February vote are listed at the bottom of this section.

May: Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic by Sam Quinones

From a small town in Mexico to the boardrooms of Big Pharma to main streets nationwide, an explosive and shocking account of addiction in the heartland of America.
In 1929, in the blue-collar city of Portsmouth, Ohio, a company built a swimming pool the size of a football field; named Dreamland, it became the vital center of the community. Now, addiction has devastated Portsmouth, as it has hundreds of small rural towns and suburbs across America--addiction like no other the country has ever faced. How that happened is the riveting story of Dreamland.
With a great reporter's narrative skill and the storytelling ability of a novelist, acclaimed journalist Sam Quinones weaves together two classic tales of capitalism run amok whose unintentional collision has been catastrophic. The unfettered prescribing of pain medications during the 1990s reached its peak in Purdue Pharma's campaign to market OxyContin, its new, expensive--extremely addictive--miracle painkiller. Meanwhile, a massive influx of black tar heroin--cheap, potent, and originating from one small county on Mexico's west coast, independent of any drug cartel--assaulted small town and mid-sized cities across the country, driven by a brilliant, almost unbeatable marketing and distribution system. Together these phenomena continue to lay waste to communities from Tennessee to Oregon, Indiana to New Mexico.
Introducing a memorable cast of characters--pharma pioneers, young Mexican entrepreneurs, narcotics investigators, survivors, and parents--Quinones shows how these tales fit together. Dreamland is a revelatory account of the corrosive threat facing America and its heartland.

Kevin will be moderating this month. Hope you can join us for some thoughtful discussion.

Upcoming books: (June is the next book selection month.)
June: Of Boys and Men: Why the Modern Male Is Struggling, Why It Matters, and What to Do about It by Richard V. Reeves (Steve)
July: We the Men: How Forgetting Women's Struggles for Equality Perpetuates Inequality by Jill Elaine Hasday (Steve)

Not selected this time:
Humanism: Five Values for Living Well by David B McLaughlin
Satan's Silence: Ritual Abuse and the Making of a Modern American Witch Hunt Paperback by Debbie Nathan and Michael Snedeker
High Conflict: Why We Get Trapped and How We Get Out by Amanda Ripley
The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America's Shining Women by Kate Moore
Fevers, Feuds, and Diamonds: Ebola and the Ravages of History by Paul Farmer