Overview

"A deeply human story, Fentanyl, Inc. is the first deep-dive investigation of a hazardous and illicit industry that has created a worldwide epidemic, ravaging communities and overwhelming and confounding government agencies that are challenged to combat it. ""A whole new crop of chemicals is radically changing the recreational drug landscape,"" writes Ben Westhoff. ""These are known as Novel Psychoactive Substances (NPS) and they include replacements for known drugs like heroin, cocaine, ecstasy, and marijuana. They are synthetic, made in a laboratory, and are much more potent than traditional drugs""―and all-too-often tragically lethal. Drugs like fentanyl, K2, and Spice―and those with arcane acronyms like 25i-NBOMe―were all originally conceived in legitimate laboratories for proper scientific and medicinal purposes. Their formulas were then hijacked and manufactured by rogue chemists, largely in China, who change their molecular structures to stay ahead of the law, making the drugs' effects impossible to predict. Westhoff has infiltrated this shadowy world. He tracks down the little-known scientists who invented these drugs and inadvertently killed thousands, as well as a mysterious drug baron who turned the law upside down in his home country of New Zealand. Westhoff visits the shady factories in China from which these drugs emanate, providing startling and original reporting on how China's vast chemical industry operates, and how the Chinese government subsidizes it. Poignantly, he chronicles the lives of addicted users and dealers, families of victims, law enforcement officers, and underground drug awareness organizers in the US and Europe. Together they represent the shocking and riveting full anatomy of a calamity we are just beginning to understand. From its depths, as Westhoff relates, are emerging new strategies that may provide essential long-term solutions to the drug crisis that has affected so many."

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9781094061450

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Reviews

"""Drawing material from official reports, drug databases, scores of interviews, and years of personal research, Westhoff presents an unflinching, illuminating portrait of a festering crisis involving a drug industry that thrives as effectively as it kills. Highly sobering, exemplary reportage delivered through richly detailed scenarios and diversified perspectives."" -- ""Kirkus Reviews (starred review)"" ""An exceptionally useful and well timed book...Westhoff very skillfully combines pharmacology, politics, law enforcement, and gripping international intrigue."" -- ""James Fallows, New York Times bestselling author"" Fentanyl, Inc. confronts horrible truths about America's opioid epidemic...It's an impressive work of investigative journalism."" -- ""USA Today"" ""A history lesson on American drug use and drug laws...Fentanyl, Inc. is a finely woven and accessible analysis...[with a] focus on the human cost of the crisis, of empathy over criminalization."" -- ""St. Louis Post-Dispatch"" ""Westhoff...covers fentanyl as a dark web profit center, from Chinese labs to US streets."" -- ""NPR"" ""Frank, insightful, and occasionally searing...Westhoff's well-reported and researched work will likely open eyes, slow knee-jerk responses, and start much needed conversations."" -- ""Publishers Weekly"" ""This book will assist policymakers, activists, and general readers in understanding better how to respond to the drug crisis that is only more intractable now."" -- ""Library Journal"""

"Fentanyl, Inc. confronts horrible truths about America's opioid epidemic...It's an impressive work of investigative journalism."" -- ""USA Today"" ""A history lesson on American drug use and drug laws...Fentanyl, Inc. is a finely woven and accessible analysis...[with a] focus on the human cost of the crisis, of empathy over criminalization."" -- ""St. Louis Post-Dispatch"" ""An exceptionally useful and well timed book...Westhoff very skillfully combines pharmacology, politics, law enforcement, and gripping international intrigue."" -- ""James Fallows, New York Times bestselling author"" ""Frank, insightful, and occasionally searing...Westhoff's well-reported and researched work will likely open eyes, slow knee-jerk responses, and start much needed conversations."" -- ""Publishers Weekly"" ""This book will assist policymakers, activists, and general readers in understanding better how to respond to the drug crisis that is only more intractable now."" -- ""Library Journal"" ""Westhoff...covers fentanyl as a dark web profit center, from Chinese labs to US streets."" -- ""NPR"" ""Drawing material from official reports, drug databases, scores of interviews, and years of personal research, Westhoff presents an unflinching, illuminating portrait of a festering crisis involving a drug industry that thrives as effectively as it kills. Highly sobering, exemplary reportage delivered through richly detailed scenarios and diversified perspectives."" -- ""Kirkus Reviews (starred review)"""

Author Information

Ben Westhoff is an award-winning investigative reporter who writes about culture, drugs, and poverty. His previous books include Original Gangstas about the birth of West Coast hip-hop and Dirty South about the rise of southern rap. He came up in the alternative weeklies Riverfront Times and LA Weekly and has also written for the Wall Street Journal, Rolling Stone, The Guardian, Vice, and Oxford American.

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