Patrick Radden Keefe
Explore Wiseley summaries of books credited to Patrick Radden Keefe.
Empire of Pain
Empire of Pain traces the Sackler family from immigrant ambition and psychiatric research to pharmaceutical wealth, OxyContin, and public disgrace. It asks how medical authority, marketing, philanthropy, and private ownership turned pain treatment into a profitable system—and how victims, journalists, courts, and activists challenged the belief that money could erase harm, clarifying links between power, responsibility, and memory.
10 chapters
Say Nothing
Say Nothing follows the Troubles through Jean McConville’s disappearance, the Price sisters’ radicalization, IRA and British intelligence operations, and the Boston College tapes. It asks how political violence becomes ordinary, how silence protects movements while wounding families, and whether peace can endure without shared truth and accountability.
11 chapters