Legendary American boxer Mike Tyson once again sh0cked public opinion when he made sh0cking confessions in his memoir Undisputed Truth

Mike Tyson memoir set to give book’s rivals the bum’s rush

Undisputed Truth, the notoriously self-destructive boxing champion’s autobiography, could be a contender in Christmas sales contest

Gloves off … Mike Tyson promotes his autobiography at a New York branch of Barnes & Noble ahead of publication. Photograph: Taylor Hill/FilmMagic

Heavyweight champion of the world, cocaine addict, convicted rapist – now Mike Tyson is set to become a bestselling author as a bare-all autobiography co-written with Larry “Ratso” Sloman races up the charts.

Such is Tyson’s struggle with addiction that a last-minute epilogue had to be added to his autobiography Undisputed Truth, after the boxer admitted in August he hadn’t been entirely straight with his co-author when he said he was clean. The fighter said he was a “vicious addict”, adding: “I haven’t drank or took drugs in six days, and for me, that’s a miracle.”

“He’s still living it, the story is very alive,” said his UK editor, HarperSport’s Rory Scarfe. “It is very intense. Sloman had this amazing relationship with him where he [Tyson] would tell him anything. He’s not David Beckham, he’s not an idol and doesn’t pretend to be. His redemption is his honesty and to have the courage to lay it all bare. He has had a terrible cocaine habit, and describes himself as a vicious alcoholic.”

Sloman has form for working with difficult-to-handle subjects. He co-wrote Scar Tissue, the bestselling 2004 memoir of Red Hot Chili Peppers’ frontman Antony Keidis, covering the depths of his drug addiction. Undisputed Truth begins with Tyson’s deprived Brooklyn upbringing, going on to cover his disastrous first marriage, his conviction for rape, his time in prison, his boxing comeback and the infamous 1997 heavyweight championship match when he bit off Ivander Holyfield’s ear. Tyson was later, briefly, reinvented by Hollywood as a comedy actor in the film The Hangover. The book also covers the death of Tyson’s four-year-old daughter, whose neck became tangled up in the cord of his running machine in 2009.

The book, which is already available as an ebook in the UK and due in print on 21 November, also claims that Tyson fought under the influence of drugs, and had several relationships while in prison. It has been riding up the “new & future releases” chart on Amazon.co.uk during the past few weeks, where it is vying for the number one spot with with Minecraft: The Official Redstone Handbook.

Scarfe said: “It’s an absolutely extraordinary story of where he came from, you wouldn’t believe the absolute deprivation – it was a brutal upbringing. At times the book reads like a film; this old Italian trainer guy Cus D’Amato took him under his wing and made him a champion. He was ferocious, destroying his opponents and always winning by a knockout.”

According to the Guardian’s Simon Hattenstone, who interviewed Tyson in 2009, the former boxer is “a very strange mix of terrifying and vulnerable”.

“When I wasn’t shitting myself I couldn’t help feeling sorry for him,” Hattenstone explained. “He’d lost so much, fucked up so much, and done incredibly well in the first place to come from such a screwed background. Weirdly, and this didn’t make it into the piece – the thing I most remember is flashing my middle-aged stomach at him, when he was having his photo taken. I think I wanted to make him laugh, or it might have been a suicide mission. Anyway he started shouting ‘did you see that? Oh my God, he’s a fairy! he’s a fairy!’ and was very nice after that.”