The Vikki LaMotta story : Jake, Raging Bull, Playboy, Sinatra and the mob

This book is the riveting story of Vikki LaMotta, whose life reads like a highlight reel from a television mini-series.

Born into poverty, raped at age fourteen, pregnant and married at sixteen and subjected to brutal beatings by her husband, world middleweight champion Jake LaMotta.

Eventually Vikki left Jake, worked as a chorus girl to support three young children, was pursued by Frank Sinatra, and became romantically involved with mob boss Sam Giancana.

At one time or another, she crossed paths with the likes of Babe Ruth, Johnny Carson, and Robert DiNiro.

At age 51, she posed nude for Playboy. The issue sold more copies to women than any issue of Playboy ever.

Knockout is a straight-from-the-heart account of a life filled with sex and violence that ultimately became a survivor's journey to redemption. 'Not an edited life but honest facts and events,' Vikki wrote to Hauser on completion of the manuscript. 'After a final reading, a deep sigh with an amazing amount of relief and exhilaration.

Not relief of a project completed but relief of a past saved, not lived in vain.'From the winner of the William Hill Sports Book of the Year award Thomas Hauser has written 38 books including as Muhammad Ali's biographer.

He is the most respected boxing writer in America, and in 2004 the Boxing Writers Association of American honoured him with the Nat Fleischer Award for Career Excellence in Boxing Journalism.