When Michael Jackson died on June 25, 2009, millions of
shocked fans gathered to grieve a beloved star whose music is
universally recognized as timeless. But the outpouring of emotion
that followed his death was bittersweet. Dogged by scandal for over
fifteen years, the pop culture icon had become untouchable in many
quarters, a fact that wounded him deeply. Now, drawing on
unprecedented access to friends, enemies, employees, and associates
of Jackson, longtime Rolling Stone contributing editor Randall
Sullivan delivers a remarkable portrait of a man both naive and
cunning, a devoted father whose parenting decisions created
international outcry, a shrewd businessman whose successes blew up
in his face and whose failures nearly brought down a
megacorporation, and an inveterate narcissist who wanted more than
anything a quiet and solitary life. Untouchable begins with
Jackson’s final four years, during which he plotted his comeback
with an album that included collaborations with Will.i.am, Kanye
West, and Carlos Santana, as well as a series of fifty megaconcerts
for which he was rehearsing until the day before his death. With
never-before-reported information about Jackson’s business dealings
and the pedophilia allegations that irreparably marked his
reputation and firsthand accounts of Jackson during his childhood
superstardom with the Jackson Five, Untouchable is a sweeping,
thorough and unflinching glimpse into the turbulent life and
untimely death of the King of Pop.