When the alluvial chunk of time known as the "late 1960s/early 1970s" is embellished with chronological endpoints, the first three novels of Thomas McGuane—The Sporting Club …, The Bushwacked Piano …, Ninety-Two in the Shade … will fit easily into the newly defined period as registers of a singular state of mind. His books were believed by his acolytes to corroborate certain deeply held beliefs of the time which responsible people usually found antithetical to the health of the nation—the idea that there is no future, for instance. Friends bestowed a McGuane novel upon an initiate sporting smiles similar to the ones on the faces of those introducing a new drug. Like the unique characters he casts as heroes, McGuane was infamous.

McGuane's heroes are forever being thwarted by those who always prevail in the nation he calls "Hotcakesland": the little Nixons, cheaters lacking wit and charm, people...