Mickey Thompson: The Fast Life and Tragic Death of a Racing Legend
SPEEDTV.com, September 2008 (views per month: 604,122).“Mickey Thompson:  The Fast Life and Tragic Death of a Racing Legend grabbed me from the second I saw the cover photograph. I would label the image “A couple of Mavericks.” The photo shows Mickey with a bandaged hand posing in front of a Ford Maverick dragster. How appropriate. Mickey was the ultimate “Maverick.” He did things one way-HIS way! Mickey Thompson: The Fast Life and Tragic Death of a Racing Legend documents the triumphs and tragedy of this motorsports legend. The book rates four out of five lug nuts. ” - Gregg Leary, SpeedTV.com“This 304-page hardcover book, which includes 75 black-and-white photographs, reacquaints readers with Thompson, who he was and what he accomplished.” – National Speed Sport News“Author Erik Arneson, through close cooperation with the Thompson family, has written a full accounting…” - Ventura County Star“It’s a compelling book which is hard to put down.” – Drag Racing Action“Despite the overtone of the couple's murder and the length of time it took for an arrest and conviction, the book is a celebration of the life of the person who, Arneson writes, would "influence more kinds of racing in a wider variety of ways than any other single person, making him the true center of the high-performance era in American history." In addition to reciting the amazing chronology of Thompson's life in motorsports, Arneson includes some delightful anecdotes: how, at age 12, Thompson and his father built a soapbox derby racer and how Mickey equipped the "car" with batteries so he could drive it back up to the top of the derby hill; how a high-school aged Thompson could do math problems in his head but couldn't duplicate his calculations on paper; how, to keep Thompson in the racecar so the crew could fix it without his input, Thompson's partner and crew chief Fritz Voigt had the crew tip the car onto its side, trapping Thompson in the driver's seat, while a leak was fixed by soldering a penny over a hole in the radiator.” - Larry Edsall, IZoom.com