On January 5th 1971,former heavyweight champion Sonny Liston was found dead at his Las Vegas home. Liston's death,labelled an overdose,has long hung over Las Vegas and the boxing world,leaving unanswered questions about his ties to mob kingpins,drug lords,billionaire hoteliers and powerful promoters. Against the backdrop of the pivotal era in the history of Las Vegas when the mob turned a sleepy desert oasis into a gambling paradise,The Murder of Sonny Liston is both a riveting murder hunt and a stunning portrait of a city that was home to the Rat Pack,race riots and glittering high-rises along the strip.
MEDIA REVIEWS
Publisher: Pan MacmillanISBN: 9781509814824Number of pages: 320Weight: 228 gDimensions: 197 x 129 x 21 mm
MEDIA REVIEWS
Readers of James Ellroy's Underworld USA Trilogy will feel very much at home.The Murder of Sonny Liston is a classic of the genre...The cast of characters in these pages is a casino-packed assembly of the showbiz stars of a neon era who performed on that fabled Strip,heroes of the prize-ring,shadowy figures of a Mafia underworld,money-grubbing hangers-on,showgirls,straight and crooked cops.Writing with the flair of a mystery writer and the attention to detail of an investigative journalist...Assael dissects the suspicious death of former heavyweight boxing champion Sonny Liston...The engrossing depiction of Sin City's corrupt cops,malevolent mobsters,and drug dens follows in the footsteps of Nick Tosches's The Devil and Sonny Liston...Assael's journey into the seedy underworld of the Las Vegas's past is worth the ride.Shaun Assael delves into Las Vegas at the turn of the'70s and uncovers a thrilling mystery. Leave it to Sonny Liston to emerge as its larger-than-life anti-hero.Mobsters,casino moguls,degenerate gamblers,junkies,strung out fighters,drug dealers,crooked cops and coke-head judges all play a role in The Murder of Sonny Liston. Shaun Assael has delved deeper into Liston's mysterious death than anybody and come up with sensational results. Investigative reporting at its finest.As tough and pounding as its subject,this is the send-off Sonny Liston deserved. Only read it if you're interested in crime,Vegas,and boxing,or the complications of being human.Drugs,booze,gambling,fixed fights. Casino moguls,crooked cops,mob bosses. The Murder of Sonny Liston has it all. Investigative reporter Shaun Assael's account of the death and life of one of boxing's biggest and saddest characters crackles with drama,tension,and suspense. It's part The Wire,part Chinatown,part The Professional-but unlike those works of fiction,all remarkably true. Stefan Fatsis,author of Word Freak and A Few Seconds of PanicAssael,a member of ESPN's investigations unit,is typically thorough in his research and approach yet manages to balance a meticulous attention to detail with a consideration for his audience,which is to say he never loses sight of the need to tell a story. The narrative is fluid and engaging,while the Las Vegas backdrop,arguably as important a character as any human being featured,is as alluring on the page as it is when witnessed in person.
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