Smack: Heroin and the American City

Schneider's absorbing history of heroin's proliferation in America draws a parallel between the evolution and decline of American cities and the rise of heroin use. Rather than treating the city as a ""backdrop,"" Schneider interprets cities as ""the organizers of the world opium market,"" and meticulously traces heroin's ascendancy from early 20th century opium dens to the 1920s jazz milieu and into the suburbs of the late 20th century suburbs when heroin finally attracted the attention of mainstream media. He identifies cities, most notably New York, as hubs of heroin distribution, where residents often futilely attempted to save their neighborhoods from further loss of capital investment and migration to the suburbs. But as people migrated, so did the drug, and Schneider expertly shows that the fusion of the counterculture and increasing urban blight helped drive heroin into white middle class neighborhoods. Interviews with former addicts and social workers resonate amid Schneider's efficient research. At the same time he remains true to his unsentimental analysis of heroin's presence in American society, revealing the extent to which American cities are financially and socially weakened hosts to a parasitic element.