"Fast-paced and impressively researched, this detailed account sings."
-Publishers Weekly, starred review
A Publishers Weekly Top Ten Book of the Summer (2021)

A propulsive, eye-opening work of reporting, chronicling the rise of Juul and the birth of a new addiction
It began with a smoke break. James Monsees and Adam Bowen were two ambitious graduate students at Stanford, and in between puffs after class they dreamed of a way to quit smoking. Their solution became the Juul, a sleek, modern device that could vaporize nicotine into a conveniently potent dosage. The company they built around that device, Juul Labs, would go on to become a $38 billion dollar company and draw blame for addicting a whole new generation of underage tobacco users.
Time magazine reporter Jamie Ducharme follows Monsees and Bowen as they create Juul and, in the process, go from public health visionaries and Silicon Valley...