Pilkington traces the evolution of Texas literature from its roots (including Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca, the state's literary "prototype, " and J. Frank Dobie, who "taught Texans how to succeed at the culture game") to its twentieth-century flowering (writers like John Graves, Rolando Hinojosa, Cormac McCarthy, and Larry McMurtry). He explores questions as diverse as who is a Texan, what makes a "Texas" writer, what distinguishes the nascent Texas literary tradition from broader southwestern literature, why regional literature is relevant, and where Texas writing is going. Adding an autobiographical dimension to literary explication, Pilkington uses his experiences of growing up in North Texas in the 1940s and 1950s to illustrate facets of the Texas mythos.