THE DEVIL'S PLAYBOOK

How the electronic cigarette industry emerged, evolved, and imploded beneath the weight of controversy and grievous misguidance.

In this comprehensive scrutiny of the vaping craze and the business behind it, Bloomberg News investigative reporter Etter focuses on two major contributors. Faced with declining adult consumption metrics throughout the 1990s, cigarette titan Altria (previously known as Philip Morris Companies Inc.) and its former upper-level executive Howard Willard III, a tobacco-industry lifer, were desperate for a comeback. Etter seamlessly infuses this story with that of tech wunderkinds and ex-smokers James Monsees and Adam Bowen, who strived to develop a nicotine delivery prototype in 2006, positioned as a beneficial “public health contribution” and an alternative to more harmfully combustive tobacco products. The author diligently chronicles the numerous redesigns of their nicotine liquid vaporizing invention, the Juul, as well as the dogged attention from tobacco executives, whom Etter categorizes as “not unlike spies” as they grew gluttonous for opportunities to collaborate or create their own version of the vape pen. Despite “gung-ho dealmaker” Willard’s former contradictory affiliations with smoking cessation programs, he forged ahead, sacrificed public safety, and became a “Juulionaire” with many others. As the interests of big tobacco and Silicon Valley came together, the e-cigarette wars declared Juul the victor, though the product became mired in corruption regarding the maximization of nicotine’s psychoactive effects and deceptive advertising of candied flavor variations targeting youth on social media. The backlash from public safety watchdogs was brutal, and as consumer trust faltered, an onslaught of personal injury lawsuits sealed the product’s fate. Etter illuminates the crucial missteps that can occur when greed and poor leadership obscure the vision of an enterprising product. Armed with an immense body of research and insider interview material, the author digs deep into the controversial industry to reveal the avarice, scandal, corporate egotism, and rampant “political knife fights.” Pair this with Jamie Ducharme’s Big Vape to get the entire sordid story in meticulous detail.

Riveting journalism that probes the triple threat of vaping, nicotine addiction, and corporate greed.