From Publishers Weekly
McGuane's uproarious novel about the misfortunes that befall a Montana real estate speculator when he is abandoned by his wife is American vernacular fiction at its best. Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Kirkus Reviews
Ex-hippie and ex-druggie Montana businessman and cattle- rancher Frank Copenhaver is winding down: ``the man who had always been just ahead of events was now slightly behind them.'' He's going broke, he's lost his wife, and his daughter is keeping company with a Montana-Firster fascist-type who is Frank's own age or thereabouts. Frank--as the good McGuane character he is--is given to outsized and far-fetched screw-ups and high-jinks, but error isn't saving him now. Nothing is. This errant yet debonair loser--McGuane's perpetual protagonist--gains something with age, though--as does McGuane. A lovely stylist always, McGuane has been handicapped by having to jab at a hip counterculture as silly as his own dandy-ish characters were. But now, with the passing of that counterculture, with only its relics like Frank Copenhaver left, it--like Frank- -takes on poignancy, and McGuane is free to become a kind of American Kingsley Amis. Unloved and unwanted by the Zeitgeist (which prefers the Perot-like doings of the Montana-Firster), Frank is an unchained eye in a novel that shares the tang of liberation and is all over the map as he thinks, for example, now about McDonald's (``Americans had overtaken their product line, if he was any judge, waiting for McThis and McThat. If there were only a few departures or insights--McShit on the toilets, anything--it would be so much easier to take one's seat in this American meeting place and not feel such despair that the world was going on without you''), now about the disappeared drug-culture (``And what fun those darn drugs were. Marvelous worlds aslant, a personal speed wobble in the middle of a civilization equally out of control. And it was wonderful, however short, to have such didactic views on everything, everyone coming down from the mountain with the tablets of stone. Hard to say what it all came to now. Skulls in the desert''). Funny, sad, deliciously written (albeit with dumb plot curlicues): McGuane's most amiable novel, perhaps his best. -- Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.


Review
"Vibrant with the pleasures of ironic language, play and chase, and quick with broken-hearted humor...I've never been so moved to admire [McGuane's] work as in this story."

-- William Kittredge,

Los Angeles Times Book Review

"Nothing but Blue Skies is nothing but enjoyable." -- San Francisco Chronicle

"McGuane's prose is so dazzlingly acute and seemingly effortless that it infuses Nothing but Blue Skies with exuberance and wit." -- Chicago Tribune.


Review
"Vibrant with the pleasures of ironic language, play and chase, and quick with broken-hearted humor...I've never been so moved to admire [McGuane's] work as in this story."

-- William Kittredge,

Los Angeles Times Book Review

"Nothing but Blue Skies is nothing but enjoyable." -- San Francisco Chronicle

"McGuane's prose is so dazzlingly acute and seemingly effortless that it infuses Nothing but Blue Skies with exuberance and wit." -- Chicago Tribune.


From the Inside Flap
Thomas McGuane's high-spirited and fiercely lyrical new novel chronicles the fall and rise of Frank Copenhaver, a man so unhinged by his wife's departure that he finds himself ruining his business, falling in love with the wrong women, and wandering the lawns of his neighborhood, desperate for the merest glimpse of normalcy.

The result is a ruefully funny novel of embattled manhood, set in the country that McGuane has made his own: a Montana where cowboys slug it out with speculators, a cattleman's best friend may be his insurance broker, and love and fishing are the only consolations that last.


From the Back Cover
"Vibrant with the pleasures of ironic language, play and chase, and quick with broken-hearted humor...I've never been so moved to admire [McGuane's] work as in this story."-- William Kittredge,Los Angeles Times Book Review"Nothing but Blue Skies is nothing but enjoyable." -- San Francisco Chronicle"McGuane's prose is so dazzlingly acute and seemingly effortless that it infuses Nothing but Blue Skies with exuberance and wit." -- Chicago Tribune.

ANNOTATION

Frank has always been one step ahead of the game: Successful in business, lucky in love, he's built a financial empire and managed to have fun along the way. He's raised a daughter who's as sensible as she is delightful, he still has time to go fishing, and his life seems as bright and clear as the big sky of Montana. But when love goes wrong, he becomes an American hero on the run from his own life.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Thomas McGuane's high-spirited and fiercely lyrical new novel chronicles the fall and rise of Frank Copenhaver, a man so unhinged by his wife's departure that he finds himself ruining his business, falling in love with the wrong women, and wandering the lawns of his neighborhood, desperate for the merest glimpse of normalcy.

The result is a ruefully funny novel of embattled manhood, set in the country that McGuane has made his own: a Montana where cowboys slug it out with speculators, a cattleman's best friend may be his insurance broker, and love and fishing are the only consolations that last.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

McGuane's uproarious novel about the misfortunes that befall a Montana real estate speculator when he is abandoned by his wife is American vernacular fiction at its best. (Feb.)

Beverly Lowry

I don't know of another writer who can walk Thomas McGuane's literary highwire. His vaunted dialogue has not been overpraised....He can describe the sky, a bird, a rock, the dawn, with such grace that you want to go out and see for yourself; and he can zip through things so funny it makes you laugh out loud. -- The New York Times

William Kittredge

Vibrant with the pleasure of ironic logic, play and faith, and equiped with broken-hearted humor...I've never been so moved to admire [McGuane's] work as in this story. -- Los Angeles Times Book Review

Kirkus Reviews

Ex-hippie and ex-druggie Montana businessman and cattle- rancher Frank Copenhaver is winding down: "the man who had always been just ahead of events was now slightly behind them." He's going broke, he's lost his wife, and his daughter is keeping company with a Montana-Firster fascist-type who is Frank's own age or thereabouts. Frank—as the good McGuane character he is—is given to outsized and far-fetched screw-ups and high-jinks, but error isn't saving him now. Nothing is. This errant yet debonair loser—McGuane's perpetual protagonist—gains something with age, though—as does McGuane. A lovely stylist always, McGuane has been handicapped by having to jab at a hip counterculture as silly as his own dandy-ish characters were. But now, with the passing of that counterculture, with only its relics like Frank Copenhaver left, it—like Frank—takes on poignancy, and McGuane is free to become a kind of American Kingsley Amis. Unloved and unwanted by the Zeitgeist (which prefers the Perot-like doings of the Montana-Firster), Frank is an unchained eye in a novel that shares the tang of liberation and is all over the map as he thinks, for example, now about McDonald's ("Americans had overtaken their product line, if he was any judge, waiting for McThis and McThat. If there were only a few departures or insights—McShit on the toilets, anything—it would be so much easier to take one's seat in this American meeting place and not feel such despair that the world was going on without you"), now about the disappeared drug-culture ("And what fun those darn drugs were. Marvelous worlds aslant, a personal speed wobble in the middle of a civilization equallyout of control. And it was wonderful, however short, to have such didactic views on everything, everyone coming down from the mountain with the tablets of stone. Hard to say what it all came to now. Skulls in the desert"). Funny, sad, deliciously written (albeit with dumb plot curlicues): McGuane's most amiable novel, perhaps his best.