DeLorean's name still gets tongues wagging

After all these years, it's still interesting to read about John DeLorean and his wonderful, wacky stainless steel sports car project.

It has been more than 30 years since the factory in Belfast, Northern Ireland, was shuttered and eight years since DeLorean died, at age 80, after having been acquitted of federal drug charges in Los Angeles and federal fraud charges in Detroit. He never reignited his career -- or his mystique -- after failing in Belfast.

But thanks to the trilogy of Back to the Future movies, DeLorean's car remains part of our cultural consciousness. Consumers can still buy stainless steel cars with gullwing doors, thanks to the new DeLorean Motor Co. in Humble, Texas, which markets DeLoreans that have been rebuilt, refurbished or assembled "new" from spare parts.

Against this backdrop, yet another book about the man and his machine has landed at booksellers.

The DeLorean Story: The Car, the People, the Scandal was written by Nick Sutton, a purchasing executive who for four years worked at DeLorean Motor Cars Ltd. in Belfast.

What Sutton's book does that earlier books did not is give an insider's view of what it was like to work for the project. Since Sutton is a car guy, this book is more informed about the carmaking part of the project. There also are anecdotes and personal insights about his colleagues and coworkers -- including candid, less than flattering characterizations of some.

Despite the word "scandal," the book doesn't dredge up any new dirt. There are no lurid whispers about who was sleeping with whom in the executive offices. And the financial shenanigans mentioned have been well chronicled elsewhere, including in Automotive News.

But there are new twists to some of the titillating conspiracy theories about how President Ronald Reagan and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher may have collaborated to scuttle the Belfast car project because they knew DeLorean was going to be arrested.

Sounds like a great movie, doesn't it?