I remember being so desvastated when I heard Pete Duel had died. This book answers all the questions about him. I wish things had of turned out differntly for Pete.. I doubt that he really meant to kill himself..a horrible accident and mistake..I want to thank Paul Green and Pamela Deuel Johnson for this great chronicle of Pete's life.

In the last 4 weeks I have gone from buying the AS&J on DVD to buying this really good book written by Paul Green. I was 11yrs old when AS&Js came to our shores here in England. Didn't pay much attention to it then as not really interested in westerns being 11 and a girl! I did see re-runs of the show in the 80s just a handful of them. Then saw the DVD for sale and have really enjoyed the show and liked the humour. Then came across Paul Greens book. I have read it in 4 days and felt all sorts of emotions reading it. It boils down to one thing. He was just a human being like us with problems, weakneses and hang ups. How many of us don't feel frustrated about the world and wish we could put things right, I know I have. There is a really good saying "you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink", family & friends who knew of his problems did their best, but as we all know there are people you can't reach no matter how hard you try.
Maybe because I have only just taken an interest in Pete Duel and I haven't been a fan of his and got into the whole thing of his death etc I can look at the book differently. I think Paul has done a excellent job and he has done his homework and contacted the correct people and they in turn have been honest. I would like to see a film made of this book.

The book has many interesting details of Peter's life that were new to me. Having known Peter in high school and briefly thereafter, I'd always assumed his untimely death was just a trajic accident. I thought maybe he was just too drunk to know the gun was loaded, or some such thing, but after reading this book I'm not so sure. To his credit, Peter was one of the very few high school "upper classmen" to befriend younger students. He stopped for me when I was hitch-hiking a couple of times when most kids his age wouldn't be bothered, and he even came to one of my birthday parties when it was almost unheard of for different classes to mix socially. It's interesting that a possible cause of Peter's auto accident was apparently never made public. Those of us that knew were all sworn to secrecy, which shows that friendship was more inportant than gossip in those days. I'm grateful that this book allows us all to know more about this talented actor and warm personality.

As a huge fan of Alias Smith and Jones and Pete Duel in my very early teen years, I looked forward with great anticipation to this book, and while it did deliver quite a bit of detail about his life and his many problems that undoubtedly led up to his tragic death, I found the book difficult to read. It seemed to jump around alot and, at times, I found it hard to follow. The author's style of writing was very clinical and dry. This was a heart wrenching and tragic stroy of a young man of unlimted talent and potential dying way before his time and it could have been told much better. I feel the subject matter deserved much better. The only thing that made it worth looking at were the many pictures that reminded me once again what a beautiful man he was.

Pete Duel was a very complex man and this book tells you in depth just how complex he was. If you want to remember Pete as something other than human don't read the book. If you want to know what made him tick read the book. This book does not sugar coat Pete's life. Paul Green gives it to you straight and that's the way I want it. After all Pete Duel was just a man.