Review of Cowboys Full

Title:

Cowboys Full: The Story of Poker

Author:

James McManus

Publisher:

Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Date:

2009

ISBN:

978-0-374-29924-8

Pages:

516

Price:

$30.00

Reviewed by Nick Christenson, npc@jetcafe.org

January 21, 2010

More poker books than I can recall have begun with a simple history of the game, but until now, nobody has created an exhaustive chronicle of poker. Cowboys Full is such a book. From the origins of playing cards to the emergence of the game along the lower Mississippi to its standardization and dissemination around the United States and eventually the world, James McManus has assembled the most thorough documentation of the history of this game ever compiled.

The main text of the book weighs in at 427 pages, but it has been broken up into 52 chapters. Most of the book was originally published as a series of articles in Card Player magazine, but they have been reworked for publication in book form. The first chapter steps out of the timeline to discuss United States political figures and their associations with the game of poker. Then the author takes us back in time to briefly discuss early gambling, the development of cards, and the other milestones that have led to the game of poker as we know it today.

Cowboys Full could have been merely a stolid academic history, but McManus goes out of his way to make it appealing to as wide an audience as possible. While there's plenty of history here, the author tries to avoid turgid details, instead sticking to the salient points. At the same time, even though the text isn't filled with archaic references or pedantic footnotes, McManus provides a section of references for each chapter citing the sources of the material he consulted. It's my opinion that this is an excellent balance between appealing to those who are casual poker readers and those, like me, who would appreciate the scholarly details that the author's publisher likely feared.

Anyone who has read McManus' earlier poker book, Positively Fifth Street, knows that he is a skilled writer who can make a story leap off the page. This is much more difficult in the parts of Cowboys Full where first-hand accounts are absent, and the author is reduced to a recitation of the facts. In some of these situations I think McManus tries a bit too hard, and the writing becomes ostentatious in spots, but overall the book is clear and readable.

Some of the stories we've heard before from other sources. The chapters on the "origins of poker", covering games such as poque, consider familiar material, but the author ties it together in new ways. Many of the stories concerning poker during the Civil War era were completely new to me, as was much of the discussion of poker in the first half of the 20th century. The chapters covering the game since the advent of the World Series of Poker are more familiar, obviously, but many contain some new details or at least a new slant on the story.

Some of the later chapters are at least as much editorial as history. Examples include McManus' thoughts on the UIGEA and the issues related to online poker, his strong preference for decorum among the game's players, and his apparent preference for increasing standardization in the game. I'm not going to take issue with any of his viewpoints on these topics, but since the vast bulk of the book is history, I find it a little jarring when his narrative suddenly shifts from reporting to commentary. I would have preferred it if Cowboys Full had stuck to history, but I expect that only the most petulant readers to consider this more than a minor distraction.

There are certainly gaps that remain in poker history that could be filled in by those willing to do additional diligent research, but overall Cowboys Full does a laudable job of compiling the most exhaustive history of the game of poker in print. Moreover, McManus compiles his information in such a way that those who would prefer to not wade through an academic tome should still be pleased with the book. I believe it is a worthwhile read for any student of the game of poker, and I recommend it.

Capsule:

Cowboys Full provides the reader with the most thorough history of the game of poker available in print. It is written in such a way that it will be appreciated both by those looking for some entertainment and scholarship. On occasion I believe the author is trying too hard to impress us with his writing ability, and at times I think he strays from reporting and winds up editorializing more than I'd prefer. Nonetheless, the book is quite a literary accomplishment, and I recommend it to anyone with an interest in the history of the game of poker.