Wow! There was a very good story here somewhere. Cody and Oakley were interesting people and their lives were fascinating. But McMurtry certainly wasn't the person to write it.

I've rarely read such a poorly-written book. It wanders around in loops, touching on the same points and events over and over. It was a rare paragraph that wasn't repeated almost verbatim at least once, and sometimes three or four times somewhere in the book. It goes off on tangents about people and events that have nothing to do with the point. The chapters were short, but even so, McMurtry couldn't contain himself. One single-page chapter began with Oakley's decision to return to show business late in life and ended with Cody's indebtedness to a business partner.

The only reason I made it though is because it was the only book I had during a three-hour wait in Arlington Heights while my daughter was at church.