Audiobooks by Bill Morris

The Lions Finally Roar: The Detroit Lions and the Road to Redemption in the NFL

"On November 22, 1963, William Clay Ford, the youngest grandson of auto pioneer Henry Ford, made a successful bid to buy the Detroit Lions of the National Football League for the unheard-of sum of $6 million. As Ford and his entourage settled down to a celebratory luncheon, their waitress delivered the news that President John F. Kennedy had been shot dead in Dallas. 'Born under a bad sign' is how Bill Ford's ownership of the Lions began. After a decade of supremacy, Ford led the team on a half-century slog of mediocrity, the fruit of his mercurial nature and undying loyalty to the wrong people. But the tide is finally turning. The Lions Finally Roar culminates with the team's recent turnaround and playoff run under the stewardship of Bill Ford's daughter, Sheila Ford Hamp. The Lions Finally Roar is about much more than football. It explores the American class system, the linked histories of Detroit and its auto and music industries, the city's changing racial dynamics, the rising power of television, and how all of it played into the NFL's transformation from a fall sport into the multi-billion dollar, year-round entertainment behemoth that is a cornerstone of American popular culture."

Bill Morris (Author), Barry Abrams (Narrator)

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Top of the Class: The complete BBC Radio 4 series

"Major public figures go back to their beginnings and uncover where they really started John Wilson (acclaimed arts and culture reporter and journalist, and presenter of Front Row, Newsnight Review and Pick of the Week) meets up with a variety of public figures from such diverse fields as food, mathematics, politics, writing and music, and takes them back to the influential schools, teachers, and early workplaces they may have forgotten, but which have not forgotten them. His guests include the first Black trade union leader, Lord Bill Morris; classical violinist Tasmin Little; the late restaurateur and television chef, Gary Rhodes; Lord Digby Jones, former Minister of State for Trade and Investment; the late Women's Prize and Costa Book Award winning author, Andrea Levy; veteran journalist, broadcaster and former politician Michael Portillo, and many more. The locations too are widely varied and richly formative - from car component manufacturers and specialist vocational institutions to grammar and private schools. Top of the Class is a fascinating look beneath the usual façade of a public figure, perfect for anyone wanting to see the human face behind a successful life story, as well as the teachers, mentors, best friends and rivals who helped them grow into the person they became. Episode guide First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on the following dates: Bill Morris 28 July 2008 Tasmin Little 4 August 2008 Lauren Child 11 August 2008 Gary Rhodes 18 August 2008 Marcus du Sautoy 28 December 2010 Rachel Portman 18 January 2011 Lord Digby Jones 25 January 2011 Michael Portillo 19 July 2011 Andrea Levy 26 July 2011 Production credits Presented by John Wilson Produced by Sarah Taylor © 2022 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd. (P) 2022 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd."

Andrea Levy, Bill Morris, Digby Jones, Gary Rhodes, John Wilson, Lauren Child, Marcus Du Sautoy, Michael Portillo, Rachel Portman, Tasmin Little (Author), Andrea Levy, Bill Morris, Digby Jones, Gary Rhodes, John Wilson, Lauren Child, Michael Portillo, Rachel Portman (Narrator)

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Motor City Burning

"From the critically acclaimed author of Motor City, Detroit comes alive in a powerful and thrilling novel set amid the chaos of the 1960s race riots and the serenity of baseball's opening day. Willie Bledsoe, once an idealistic young black activist, is now a burnt-out case. After leaving a snug berth at Tuskegee Institute to join the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, he has become bitterly disillusioned with the civil rights movement and its leaders. He returns home to Alabama to try to write a memoir about his time in the cultural whirlwind, but the words fail to come. The surprise return of his Vietnam veteran brother in the spring of 1967 gives Willie a chance to drive a load of smuggled guns to the Motor City—and make enough money to jump-start his stalled dream of writing his memoir. There, at Tiger Stadium on Opening Day of the 1968 baseball season—postponed two days in deference to the funeral of Martin Luther King Jr.—Willie learns some terrifying news: the Detroit police are still investigating the last unsolved murder from the bloody, apocalyptic riot of the previous summer, and a white cop named Frank Doyle will not rest until the case is solved. And Willie is his prime suspect. Bill Morris' rich and thrilling novel sets Doyle's hunt amid the history of one of America's most tortured and fascinating cities, as Doyle and Willie struggle with Detroit's deep racial divide, with revenge and forgiveness, and with the realization that justice is rarely attainable—and rarely just."

Bill Morris (Author), Richard Small (Narrator)

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