The Duke, Carlos Acevedo
The Duke, Carlos Acevedo
List: $19.99 | Sale: $13.99
Club: $9.99

The Duke
The Life and Lies of Tommy Morrison

Author: Carlos Acevedo

Narrator: Brian P. Craig

Unabridged: 9 hr 6 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 05/31/2022


Synopsis

An American Gothic . . .

In the early 1990s, Tommy Morrison, a young roughneck from Jay, Oklahoma, burst onto the boxing scene to become one of the most controversial fighters of his era. Handsome, eloquent, and dynamic, Morrison parlayed destructive knockout power and a homespun personality into celebrity status throughout middle America, where boxing rarely prospered.

But it was his starring role in Rocky V alongside Sylvester Stallone that propelled him to stardom–and ultimately led to his tragic downfall. His brush with Hollywood fame triggered a limitless appetite for parties, liquor, and sex. When Morrison was shockingly diagnosed with HIV in 1996, his life imploded, and his subsequent descent into drugs, prison, bigamy, and conspiracy theories made Morrison notorious long after his glory days had ended.

In The Duke, Carlos Acevedo chronicles Morrison's tumultuous life from his days as a teenaged Toughman contestant, to his victory over George Foreman, to his struggles with HIV and depression, to his death at forty-four, when his delusions finally overtook him.

About Carlos Acevedo

Carlos Acevedo, author of Sporting Blood: Tales From the Dark Side of Boxing and The Duke: The Life and Lies of Tommy Morrison, was the founder of The Cruelest Sport and is a member of the Boxing Writers Association of America. His work has appeared in Inside HBO Boxing, Boxing News, Remezcla, Boxing Digest, and Hannibal Boxing. His stories A Darkness Made to Order and A Ghost Orbiting Forever both won first place awards from the BWAA. Acevedo is also a member of the International Boxing Research Organization.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Jimmy on April 29, 2022

If you’ve read Acevedo before, in the various online publications he’s written for, or in his first book “Sporting Blood: Tales from the Dark Side of Boxing,” his latest offering will feel familiar. The depth and breadth of his research, a quality that sets him apart (and above), is once more used t......more

Goodreads review by Adam on December 14, 2022

This book is split into two sections, the first being his upbringing and boxing career and the second half after his HIV diagnosis. Tommy was certainly a big achiever in terms of his popularity, but his boxing record was padded out with a lot of professional losers and no hopers. His success in land......more

Goodreads review by Jonathan Rand on June 19, 2022

A classic crash and burn tale This is a brutally honest account of a fighter who was a heavyweight contender with tremendous box office appeal but who couldn't cope with his personal demons. As a sportswriter who covered much of Morrison's career, this book brings back a lot of memories for me and on......more

Goodreads review by Andrew on January 09, 2024

Great Lived this book. Acevedo knows the world of boxing and writes beautifully. The story of Morrison is a classic American failure tale. Read this if you are interested in boxing or just a biography of a very sad but interesting Tommy Morrison.......more

Goodreads review by Jason on January 29, 2024

If you have a love/hate relationship with boxing like i do, this is a great read. I always knew Tommy Morrison was a POS, but I thought it was the CTE that turned him that way... turns out he was born a POS, and even the AIDS couldn't make him an even remotely decent person.......more