Out of deadly rivalry, McGuane has constructed a novel with the impetus of a thriller & the heartbroken humor that is his distinct contribution to American prose. 6x9 inches, 208 pgs.

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Tiring of the company of junkies and burn-outs, Thomas Skelton goes home to Key West to take up a more wholesome life. But things fester in America's utter South. And Skelton's plans to become a skiff guide in the shining blue subtropical waters place him on a collision course with Nichol Dance, who has risen to the crest of the profession by dint of infallible instincts and a reputation for homicide. Out of their deadly rivalry, Thomas McGuane has constructed a novel with the impetus of a thriller and the heartbroken humor that is his distinct contribution to American prose.


"Full of surprises and rewards and an exhilaration one feels only rarely.... I offer a gentle exhortation -- please read this book." -- Newsday

"Thomas McGuane makes the page, the paragraph, the sentence itself a record of continuous imaginative activity.... He is an important as well as a brilliant novelist." -- The New York Times Book Review

"McGuane's sense of place, his harsh and delicate exactness of detail are at their keenest." -- Newsweek

"Few writers have explored our national malaise as persistently -- or as elegantly -- as Thomas McGuane, a writer whose command of the language has helped define our American loneliness." -- Philadelphia Inquirer

By Thomas McGuane - 1995