EBookClubs

Read Books & Download eBooks Full Online

EBookClubs

Read Books & Download eBooks Full Online

Book Opium Fiend

Download or read book Opium Fiend written by Steven Martin and published by Villard. This book was released on 2012-06-26 with total page 417 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A renowned authority on the secret world of opium recounts his descent into ruinous obsession with one of the world’s oldest and most seductive drugs, in this harrowing memoir of addiction and recovery. A natural-born collector with a nose for exotic adventure, San Diego–born Steven Martin followed his bliss to Southeast Asia, where he found work as a freelance journalist. While researching an article about the vanishing culture of opium smoking, he was inspired to begin collecting rare nineteenth-century opium-smoking equipment. Over time, he amassed a valuable assortment of exquisite pipes, antique lamps, and other opium-related accessories—and began putting it all to use by smoking an extremely potent form of the drug called chandu. But what started out as recreational use grew into a thirty-pipe-a-day habit that consumed Martin’s every waking hour, left him incapable of work, and exacted a frightful physical and financial toll. In passages that will send a chill up the spine of anyone who has ever lived in the shadow of substance abuse, Martin chronicles his efforts to control and then conquer his addiction—from quitting cold turkey to taking “the cure” at a Buddhist monastery in the Thai countryside. At once a powerful personal story and a fascinating historical survey, Opium Fiend brims with anecdotes and lore surrounding the drug that some have called the methamphetamine of the nineteenth-century. It recalls the heyday of opium smoking in the United States and Europe and takes us inside the befogged opium dens of China, Thailand, Vietnam, and Laos. The drug’s beguiling effects are described in vivid detail—as are the excruciating pains of withdrawal—and there are intoxicating tales of pipes shared with an eclectic collection of opium aficionados, from Dutch dilettantes to hard-core addicts to world-weary foreign correspondents. A compelling tale of one man’s transformation from respected scholar to hapless drug slave, Opium Fiend puts us under opium’s spell alongside its protagonist, allowing contemporary readers to experience anew the insidious allure of a diabolical vice that the world has all but forgotten.

Book Opium Fiend

    Book Details:
  • Author : Steven Martin
  • Publisher : Villard Books
  • Release : 2012
  • ISBN : 0345517830
  • Pages : 417 pages

Download or read book Opium Fiend written by Steven Martin and published by Villard Books. This book was released on 2012 with total page 417 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An authority on opium paraphernalia traces the history of opium use while recounting his descent into addiction, describing how his experiments while researching an article led to a dangerous habit that prompted numerous rehabilitation efforts.

Book Diary of a Drug Fiend

    Book Details:
  • Author : Aleister Crowley
  • Publisher : Blurb
  • Release : 2018-09
  • ISBN : 9780464877257
  • Pages : 222 pages

Download or read book Diary of a Drug Fiend written by Aleister Crowley and published by Blurb. This book was released on 2018-09 with total page 222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The true story of Aleister Crowley's own experience with drugs.

Book Baboe Dalima  Or  The Opium Fiend

    Book Details:
  • Author : M T H (Michael Theophile Perelaer
  • Publisher : Legare Street Press
  • Release : 2021-09-09
  • ISBN : 9781013806025
  • Pages : 284 pages

Download or read book Baboe Dalima Or The Opium Fiend written by M T H (Michael Theophile Perelaer and published by Legare Street Press. This book was released on 2021-09-09 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

Book The Art of Opium Antiques

Download or read book The Art of Opium Antiques written by Steven Martin and published by . This book was released on 2007 with total page 136 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Explores an aspect of opium that has largely been ignored--the art and accoutrements associated with opium smoking that reached a pinnacle in nineteenth-century China and in Chinese communities abroad, from Saigon to Singapore to San Francisco.

Book Opium for the Masses

Download or read book Opium for the Masses written by Jim Hogshire and published by . This book was released on 1994 with total page 132 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Opium. Known as 'The Mother of All Analgesics,' it's probably the greatest pain killer ever discovered. Opium is the parent of morphine, heroin, laudanum, Darvocet, Darvon, and many other pain relievers. Opium causes poets to rhapsodize and nations to go to war. 'Religion... is the opium of the people,' said Karl Marx, but some people insist on the real thing. In Opium for the Masses, Jim Hogshire tells you everything you want to know about the beloved poppy and its amazing properties [...] As he reveals the secrets of the seductive opium poppy, he tells the sad story of prescription drugs: doctors, drug makers and governments prohibiting natural remedies in favor of harsh synthetic derivatives. Opium for the Masses includes rare photographs and detailed illustrations that bring this magnificent plant to life."--From cover.

Book Drug Use for Grown Ups

Download or read book Drug Use for Grown Ups written by Dr. Carl L. Hart and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2022-01-11 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Hart’s argument that we need to drastically revise our current view of illegal drugs is both powerful and timely . . . when it comes to the legacy of this country’s war on drugs, we should all share his outrage.” —The New York Times Book Review From one of the world's foremost experts on the subject, a powerful argument that the greatest damage from drugs flows from their being illegal, and a hopeful reckoning with the possibility of their use as part of a responsible and happy life Dr. Carl L. Hart, Ziff Professor at Columbia University and former chair of the Department of Psychology, is one of the world's preeminent experts on the effects of so-called recreational drugs on the human mind and body. Dr. Hart is open about the fact that he uses drugs himself, in a happy balance with the rest of his full and productive life as a researcher and professor, husband, father, and friend. In Drug Use for Grown-Ups, he draws on decades of research and his own personal experience to argue definitively that the criminalization and demonization of drug use--not drugs themselves--have been a tremendous scourge on America, not least in reinforcing this country's enduring structural racism. Dr. Hart did not always have this view. He came of age in one of Miami's most troubled neighborhoods at a time when many ills were being laid at the door of crack cocaine. His initial work as a researcher was aimed at proving that drug use caused bad outcomes. But one problem kept cropping up: the evidence from his research did not support his hypothesis. From inside the massively well-funded research arm of the American war on drugs, he saw how the facts did not support the ideology. The truth was dismissed and distorted in order to keep fear and outrage stoked, the funds rolling in, and Black and brown bodies behind bars. Drug Use for Grown-Ups will be controversial, to be sure: the propaganda war, Dr. Hart argues, has been tremendously effective. Imagine if the only subject of any discussion about driving automobiles was fatal car crashes. Drug Use for Grown-Ups offers a radically different vision: when used responsibly, drugs can enrich and enhance our lives. We have a long way to go, but the vital conversation this book will generate is an extraordinarily important step.

Book Opium for the Masses

    Book Details:
  • Author : Jim Hogshire
  • Publisher : Feral House
  • Release : 2010-08-01
  • ISBN : 1936239019
  • Pages : 201 pages

Download or read book Opium for the Masses written by Jim Hogshire and published by Feral House. This book was released on 2010-08-01 with total page 201 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A practical guide to growing and using poppies and other botanical wonders.

Book Fiend

    Book Details:
  • Author : Jemiah Jefferson
  • Publisher : 47North
  • Release : 2013-03-12
  • ISBN : 9781477807026
  • Pages : 0 pages

Download or read book Fiend written by Jemiah Jefferson and published by 47North. This book was released on 2013-03-12 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this terrifying prequel to "Wounds" and "Voice of the Blood," the origins of the vampire Ricar are revealed--as told by Ricar himself. Original.

Book Smoke and Ashes

    Book Details:
  • Author : Abir Mukherjee
  • Publisher : Simon and Schuster
  • Release : 2019-03-05
  • ISBN : 164313115X
  • Pages : 357 pages

Download or read book Smoke and Ashes written by Abir Mukherjee and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2019-03-05 with total page 357 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Captain Sam Wyndham and his sidekick Surrender-Not Banerjee return in this prize-winning historical crime series set in 1920s Calcutta. India, 1921. Haunted by his memories of World War I, Captain Sam Wyndham is battling a serious addiction to opium that he must keep secret from his superiors in the Calcutta police force. When Sam is summoned to investigate a grisly murder, he is stunned at the sight of the body: he’s seen this before. Last night, in a drug addled haze, he stumbled across a corpse with the same ritualistic injuries. It seems like there’s a deranged killer on the loose. Unfortunately for Sam, the corpse was in an opium den—and revealing his presence there could cost him his career. With the aid of his quick-witted Indian Sergeant, Surrender-Not Banerjee, Sam must try to solve the two murders, all the while keeping his personal demons secret, before somebody else turns up dead.

Book Confessions of an English Opium Eater

Download or read book Confessions of an English Opium Eater written by Thomas de Quincey and published by Gottfried & Fritz. This book was released on 2015-06-24 with total page 110 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A book about opium usage and the effects of addiction on the authors life.

Book You Can t Win

Download or read book You Can t Win written by Jack Black and published by Courier Dover Publications. This book was released on 2018-10-17 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Much of this book is about loneliness. Yet its pages are bracingly companionable. It is one of the friendliest books ever written. It is a superb piece of autobiography, testimony that cannot be impeached. While it is a statement of an American tragedy, it has laughter, brevity, style; as a book to pass the time away with, it is in a class with the best fiction." — Carl Sandburg, New York World "Nothing half as rewarding has come down the highway of books about thieves, tramps, murderers, bootleggers and crooks in years " — New Republic "I believe Jack Black has written a remarkable book; it is vivid and picturesque; it is not fiction; it is a book that was needed and it should be widely read." — Clarence Darrow, New York Herald Tribune A major influence on William S. Burroughs and other Beat writers, this lost classic was written by Jack Black, a drifter and small-time criminal. Born in 1872, Black hit the road at the age of 16 and spent most of his life as a vagabond. In this plainspoken but colorful memoir, he recaptures a hobo underworld of the early twentieth century, a time when it was possible to pass anonymously from town to town. Black's firsthand accounts of hopping trains, burglaries, prison, and drug addiction offer a compelling portrait of life outside the law and honor among thieves.

Book Opium

    Book Details:
  • Author : John H. Halpern
  • Publisher : Hachette Books
  • Release : 2019-08-13
  • ISBN : 0316417653
  • Pages : 331 pages

Download or read book Opium written by John H. Halpern and published by Hachette Books. This book was released on 2019-08-13 with total page 331 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From a psychiatrist on the frontlines of addiction medicine and an expert on the history of drug use comes the "authoritative, engaging, and accessible" history of the flower that helped to build (Booklist) -- and now threatens -- modern society. Opioid addiction is fast becoming the most deadly crisis in American history. In 2018, it claimed nearly fifty thousand lives -- more than gunshots and car crashes combined, and almost as many Americans as were killed in the entire Vietnam War. But even as the overdose crisis ravages our nation -- straining our prison system, dividing families, and defying virtually every legislative solution to treat it -- few understand how it came to be. Opium tells the "fascinating" (Lit Hub) and at times harrowing tale of how we arrived at today's crisis, "mak[ing] timely and startling connections among painkillers, politics, finance, and society" (Laurence Bergreen). The story begins with the discovery of poppy artifacts in ancient Mesopotamia, and goes on to explore how Greek physicians and obscure chemists discovered opium's effects and refined its power, how colonial empires marketed it around the world, and eventually how international drug companies developed a range of powerful synthetic opioids that led to an epidemic of addiction. Throughout, Dr. John Halpern and David Blistein reveal the fascinating role that opium has played in building our modern world, from trade networks to medical protocols to drug enforcement policies. Most importantly, they disentangle how crucial misjudgments, patterns of greed, and racial stereotypes served to transform one of nature's most effective painkillers into a source of unspeakable pain -- and how, using the insights of history, state-of-the-art science, and a compassionate approach to the illness of addiction, we can overcome today's overdose epidemic. This urgent and masterfully woven narrative tells an epic story of how one beautiful flower became the fascination of leaders, tycoons, and nations through the centuries and in their hands exposed the fragility of our civilization. An NPR Best Book of the Year"A landmark project." -- Dr. Andrew Weil"Engrossing and highly readable." -- Sam Quinones"An astonishing journey through time and space." -- Julie Holland, MD"The most important, provocative, and challenging book I've read in a long time." -- Laurence Bergreen

Book The Cowboy

    Book Details:
  • Author : Joan Johnston
  • Publisher : Dell
  • Release : 2000-02-08
  • ISBN : 0440223806
  • Pages : 402 pages

Download or read book The Cowboy written by Joan Johnston and published by Dell. This book was released on 2000-02-08 with total page 402 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Joan Johnston transports us to rugged present-day Texas—a place of wide-open prairies and unbridled ambitions—where two ranching families, the Blackthornes and the Creeds, are locked in a bitter century-old feud. Here, Johnston brings to life a breathtaking love story—between the Blackthornes' oldest son and the Creeds' beautiful daughter—a magnificent novel of passion, vengeance, and star-crossed love. Trace Blackthorne was taught from the cradle to take what he wanted. And he wanted Callie Creed. Eleven years ago, the feud between their families had torn them apart. But now Trace has come home, a ruthless hard-eyed stranger, making her an offer she couldn't refuse: marry him and save her struggling family from financial ruin. But the secrets of the past return to haunt them. And Callie is once again compelled to make an impossible choice—between the family who desperately needs her and the only man she has ever loved.

Book Do What Thou Wilt

Download or read book Do What Thou Wilt written by Lawrence Sutin and published by St. Martin's Press. This book was released on 2014-07-08 with total page 514 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Do What Thou Wilt: An exploration into the life and works of a modern mystic, occultist, poet, mountaineer, and bisexual adventurer known to his contemporaries as "The Great Beast" Aleister Crowley was a groundbreaking poet and an iconoclastic visionary whose literary and cultural legacy extends far beyond the limits of his notoriety as a practitioner of the occult arts. Born in 1875 to devout Christian parents, young Aleister's devotion scarcely outlived his father, who died when the boy was twelve. He reached maturity in the boarding schools and brothels of Victorian England, trained to become a world-class mountain climber, and seldom persisted with any endeavor in which he could be bested. Like many self-styled illuminati of his class and generation, the hedonistic Crowley gravitated toward the occult. An aspiring poet and a pampered wastrel - obsessed with reconciling his quest for spiritual perfection and his inclination do exactly as he liked in the earthly realm - Crowley developed his own school of mysticism. Magick, as he called it, summoned its users to embrace the imagination and to glorify the will. Crowley often explored his spiritual yearnings through drug-saturated vision quests and rampant sexual adventurism, but at other times he embraced Eastern philosophies and sought enlightenment on ascetic sojourns into the wilderness. This controversial individual, a frightening mixture of egomania and self-loathing, has inspired passionate - but seldom fair - assessments from historians. Lawrence Sutin, by treating Crowley as a cultural phenomenon, and not simply a sorcerer or a charlatan, convinces skeptic readers that the self-styled "Beast" remains a fascinating study in how one man devoted his life to the subversion of the dominant moral and religious values of his time.

Book The Birth of Heroin and the Demonization of the Dope Fiend

Download or read book The Birth of Heroin and the Demonization of the Dope Fiend written by Th Metzger and published by . This book was released on 1998 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: