The Murder of Sonny Liston: A Story of Fame, Heroin, Boxing Las Vegas
Author(s): Shaun Assael
Secondhand.
On December 30th, 1970, at the age of 38, former heavyweight champion Sonny Liston died from what Las Vegas police suspected was a heroin overdose. When police arrived, they found a one-ounce balloon on Sonny's nightstand but the coroner quickly labelled Sonny's passing as death by natural causes. To this day, Liston's death hovers over Las Vegas and the sports world, leaving unanswered questions about his ties to powerful boxing promoters, billionaire hoteliers, mob kingpins and shadowy drug lords. Reviving boxing's most infamous cold case to work out what really happened on that night in December over forty years ago, in The Murder of Sonny Liston: A Story of Fame, Heroin, Boxing Las Vegas Shaun Assael examines the last mysterious year of Liston's life against the backdrop of a pivotal year in the history of Las Vegas. 1970 was the year that the mob turned a sleepy desert oasis into a cathedral of corporate gambling. Glittering new towers were rising along the strip, while race riots were devastating the black community, creating two very different cities for Sonny Liston to disappear into. With key aspects of Liston's life previously ignored or glossed over, Assael takes a fresh look at Liston's complicated life, getting to the bottom of one of America's most enduring mysteries, while painting a stunning portrait of mob-run Las Vegas in the 1970s.
General Information
- :
- : Pan Macmillan
- : Macmillan
- : 0.432
- : 30 September 2016
- : 234mm X 153mm
- : United Kingdom
- : 01 October 2016
- : books
Other Specifications
- : Shaun Assael
- : Paperback
- : Main Market Ed.
- : en
- : 796.83092
- : 320
More About The Product
An in-depth examination into the murder of Heavyweight Champion Sonny Liston.
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. -- Nicholas Pileggi 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. Publishers Weekly 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. -- Nigel Collins, Former editor-in-chief, The Ring magazine, and 2015 inductee, International Boxing Hall of Fame 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. -- Robert Lipsyte, author of The Contender and An Accidental Sportswriter 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 Panic
Shaun Assael, who has been with ESPN The Magazine since its launch in 1996, is a member of ESPN's investigations unit and a regular contributor to the prime-time show E:60. He is also the author of three books: Wide Open: Days and Nights on the NASCAR Tour; Sex, Lies, and Headlocks, which was a New York Times bestseller; and Steroid Nation.