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Usually ships in 1 business days | | | | | | At the age of 17, David McCumber was stricken with "road fever" that irresistible call to the itinerant life of a professional gambler. Twenty-two years later, he got the chance to follow that dream-not as a player but as the "stakehorse" (financial backer) for Tony Annigoni, a non-smoking, macrobiotic-eating "Renaissance Pool Hustler," student of Eastern religion, and master of the pure green-felt poetry of the dead stroke." With $27,000 in David's pocket they took off together on an astonishing four-month odyssey across America-traveling from seedy, hole-in-the-wall billiard parlors to high-class snooker rooms to high-tension pro tourneys, from Seattle to Miami and back again-exploring a shady twilight subculture and uniquely American mythos, in search of serious money, local glory...and the perfect hustle. | | | |
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| | Product Details | | Author: | David Mccumber | | Paperback: | 384 pages | | Publisher: | It Books | | Publication Date: | April 01, 1997 | | Language: | English | | ISBN: | 0380729237 | | Package Length: | 8.0 inches | | Package Width: | 5.4 inches | | Package Height: | 1.1 inches | | Package Weight: | 0.65 pounds | | Average Customer Rating: |  based on 31 reviews |
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 weird living, great writing. Jan 22, 2010
I loved this book twice. I play pool so it has personal interest. But I also read and the writing is great. It is really like a memoir, a diary, an autobiography and a biography rolled into one. It depicts a dying world of pool road hustling. One of the best books on this subject. Lots of the characters are still around ( and at the Derby City Classic right now, today).
 pretty good read Sep 06, 2009
overall this book was a very good read, especially if you like the road hustler stories. David McCumber is a writer with $27,000 in his pocket and he stakes a pool hall owner tony on the road as they venture into a cross country gambling tour that takes them all over the country looking for action(even in Canada). they start off riding the Amtrak like the old time hustlers use to but quickly switch to renting a cadillac after realizing the trains are often way behind schedule. The only bad part i find in this book is alot of the places they go to, they never find any action and Tony is forced to enter local pool tournaments and usually ends up losing in the early rounds to locals. Actually, alot of the money they win is attributed to Tony's former stakehorse named bucktooth, who is a old, loud mouthed hustler. Tony seemed to be off and on through most of the book, and there winnings are minimal until the end. Tony beats some top pros like Jonny Archer and billy cress but at the same time, he struggles with local amatuers which really threw me off and led me to believe that Tony wasn't as good as david led on. Again the book is definetely worth the read and the book is very well written
Hustling Pool in the 1990s with a Pool Pro and a (Semi) Objective Observer. Apr 15, 2009
David McCumber is a journalist and lifelong pool aficionado who decided to combine his youthful fantasy of playing pool on the road with some enthusiastic investigative journalism. In 1992, he asked professional pool player Tony Annigoni, proprietor of San Francisco's "Q Club" at the time, to go on the road with him. McCumber describes Annigoni as "a Rennaissance hustler": macrobiotic, into jazz, a student of Eastern religion, with a background in computer sales. McCumber offers to be Tony's stakehorse on an ambitious program of pool halls, snooker rooms, and tournaments, a 13,000-mile, 4 month journey across the United States and Canada hustling pool.
And so they're off, by train, plane, and automobile, to Seattle, Vancouver, Toronto, New York, Philadelphia, Washington DC, Akron, Baltimore, Miami, Los Angeles, Reno, and I've left some out. There is a lot of pool hall dialogue in "Playing Off the Rail", which I assume the author recorded. It is through the dialogue that the personalities make their impression. A lot of big-time pool players come and go, often showing up again in another city. It gives the impression that hustling pool is as mobile a culture as it ever was. The fleabag hotels where David and Tony stay to save on costs also evoke stereotypes. Even the high stakes players don't always live well.
The variety of strong personalities, from millionaires to thugs, who hustle pool is a source of great entertainment. This road trip with McCumber and Annigoni conveys better than anything else I've seen or read how difficult it is to make money this way. Finding a high stakes game is, itself, not easy. And finding one that you can win is not easy either, even for a talented player like Tony. There seems to be an abundance of talent and desperation but not always of cash. I'm not knowledgeable about pool. I'm sure that readers who are will appreciate the play-by-lay of pool games more. But "Playing Off the Rail" is a fascinating glimpse into relatively contemporary pool hustling culture.
1 of 1 found the following review helpful:
Gritty and Real Jan 07, 2009
A fantastic insight into the sordid life of pool hustling. McCumber paints a fantastic picture of the dark and smoky, dangerous world of urban poolrooms, dive bars, and their clientele. He delves also into the subtleties of the modern game and the juxtaposition with historic people and places.
In the vein of "Gonzo Journalism" Mccumber has written a book that is certainly appreciated by anyone interested in the various games of pool and billiards, but uses enough imagery and verbiage to capture even those with a smattering of insight of the game.
1 of 1 found the following review helpful:
Takes one back to the "good old days".... Jul 12, 2008
Having found this book in a WSJ review on the top 5 gambling books, I elected to order. I had spent two high school years in "small town america" in the 60's, where one of the major local activities was "Drew's pool hall". Looking back, I see alot of similarities in McCumber's book. The "stale cigar smoke, the stale aspirations of old men,the rebellious 8th graders slouched eating slim jims"....and the 9 ball table at the front near the bar where all the real action was.
What other game gives you colorfull names like Bucktooth (the "Tooth"), Kamikazie Bob, Waterdog, among many others?
McCumber takes us on a whirlwind tour of the U.S. and Canada with one pool player (hustler?) and one money staker, McCumber himself. The locations and pool games are timeless and one has to wonder if this tradition continues today.
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