One of the central characters in Home Is Where the Bodies Are is Nicole Thomas, who develops an addiction to prescription pain medication after being involved in a car accident. Nicole struggles for seven years before finally overcoming dependency on drugs. She says:

In my twenties, it was weed, alcohol, and cocaine, whenever I could get my hands on it. But I was functioning, until I got a taste for something stronger—much stronger than myself. It was the oxy the doctors prescribed. They kept me on it for far too long, and then they cut me off cold turkey without a plan in place. So, I made a plan of my own. Get high or die trying. And I almost did many times (121).

Nicole’s plight mirrors the very real experiences of millions of Americans who are dealing with opioid addiction. The opioid crisis began in the 1990s when doctors routinely prescribed opiates to their patients for pain management. An aggressive push by pharmaceutical companies lobbied doctors to prescribe their powerful drugs to patients. Marketing reps assured prescribing physicians that these products were non-addictive. However, drugs like oxycodone and fentanyl affect the brain in the same way as heroin or morphine and create a chemical dependency.