This is a fascinating and well-written book, especially considering that the author admits that he wanted nothing to do with DeLorean for decades after the company folded. It's worth the wait: Nick Sutton has written with an unbiased eye and a clear memory, bolstered by years of research and witty personal recollections of some of the more colorful aspects of working in an under-funded, over-staffed, deadline-pressing company expected to make miracles.
The author explains that, in a way, miracles did happen -- through the sweat, stress, and grit of employees who, regardless of their political or religious affiliations, took John DeLorean's dream into their own. Sutton's tales of workers' struggles during and against The Troubles are particularly poignant and resonate still today for those of us old enough to remember those years and the turmoil contained therein. Sutton explains how a distant American could not have known exactly what the challenges were, and how a combination of genius, foolhardiness, and self-assurance can cause great success or great failure in any man, and what it led to in the case of John DeLorean and his company. Northern Ireland of the time is put into terrific context, and from the book one can get a great sense of what "normal" occurrences led to sticky problems even for someone trying to keep life simple as a normal workaday man or woman.
But more than that, Sutton puts faces and stories to many who did not work with John DeLorean directly, and therefore languished out of the light of history for many years -- the people who worked not for fame or power but to make a good product against near-hopeless odds. Humanizing the anonymous is a difficult thing to do, particularly as one's memories soften with age, but Sutton's stories of the folks at DMC Limited are sharp and emotionally relevant.
Nor does Sutton spare the reader the agonizing details of how the company came to a slow crash. Missing money, a drugs trial, distant management, and -- perhaps hitherto unknown to most American readers -- political machinations in the UK? Was Margaret Thatcher involved? Of course, I can't tell, but I can say that you might be surprised by just how complex the story really is.
I think Sutton's book is a great read, plus it contains lots of information for car buffs and history buffs, too -- including some never-before-seen photographs. I look forward to reading it again and again.
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