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Cargando... Great American Outpost: Dreamers, Mavericks, and the Making of an Oil Frontierpor Maya Rao
   Ninguno Actualmente no hay Conversaciones sobre este libro.  Narshkite | Jan 30, 2020 |    ) froxgirl | Jul 3, 2018 | sin reseñas | añadir una reseña
"A surreal, lyrical work of narrative nonfiction that portrays how the largest domestic oil discovery in half a century transformed a forgotten corner of the American West into a crucible of breakneck capitalism. As North Dakota became the nation's second-largest oil producer, Maya Rao set out in steel-toe boots to join a wave of drifters, dreamers, entrepreneurs, and criminals. With an eye for the dark, absurd, and humorous, Rao fearlessly immersed herself in their world to chronicle this modern-day gold rush, from its heady beginnings to OPEC's price war against the US oil industry. She rode shotgun with a surfer-turned-truck driver braving toxic fumes and dangerous roads, dined with businessmen disgraced during the financial crisis, and reported on everyone in between-including an ex-con YouTube celebrity, a trophy wife mired in scandal, and a hard-drinking British Ponzi schemer-in a social scene so rife with intrigue that one investor called the oilfield Peyton Place on steroids. As the boom receded, a culture of greed and recklessness left troubling consequences for investors and longtime residents. Empty trailers and idle oil equipment littered the fields like abandoned farmsteads, leaving the pioneers who built this unlikely civilization to reckon with their legacy. Part Barbara Ehrenreich, part Upton Sinclair, Great American Outpost is a sobering exploration of twenty-first-century America that reads like a frontier novel."--Inside jacket flap. No se han encontrado descripciones de biblioteca. |
Debates activosNingunoCubiertas populares
 Google Books — Cargando...GénerosSistema Decimal Melvil (DDC)338.27282Social sciences Economics Production Mineral Extraction By Product Carbonaceous materials Oil, oil shales, tar sands, natural gas OilClasificación de la Biblioteca del CongresoValoraciónPromedio: (3.4)
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1
Rao did her work, really good information gathering. It was stupid work honestly, she is lucky she was not raped or killed or sold into white slavery. It happened a lot during the boom, mostly to Native American women, but not exclusively. Rao barely mentions any of that. The problem is that the story had no point of view, no through line, no moral to the story. It was an organizational nightmare and bounced from topic to topic like a 10 year old off his Adderall. Because it was so disjointed, and perhaps because she chose as the only constant character Danny, a guy who was dull, and irresponsible and most definitely no genius, there was nothing to connect with. I found my interest wandering with some frequency, and found a number of times I had to go back because I had no idea what had just happened. This reporting (in a heavily edited form) would have made a great series of articles, but it did not make a book. A book needs something to hold it together. I also suspect that Rao saw these people as her friends. I imagine that it is hard to stay objective when you have lived together through the hardships and hazards they did. Its an issue I have always had with embedded reporters during wartime. Though she mentions offhand that these people might have been sex offenders or con men its often in a whisper -- she focuses on the good. That is what friends do. For reporters though, that is where you lose the story. I admire Rao's grit, but I really wish this book had been better. (