Life of Evel

Comprehensive, satisfying biography of the self-proclaimed P.T. Barnum for the modern age. Robert Craig Knievel and brother Nick were raised by their paternal grandparents in depression-era Montana. A youthful ladies' man, Bobby carried his inherent charm into high school, where he excelled in sports rather than academics. Fiercely independent, he left school at 16 to enlist in the Army, got married and had a son, yet continued to get into petty local mischief. He doggedly pursued his love of cycling and eventually found a way to make it pay. After jumping over mountain lions, snakes and Mack trucks, Evel (a nickname of debatable origins) kicked his daredevil days into high gear with a jump over the Caesar's Palace fountains in 1967, which placed the white jump-suited stuntman into a month-long coma. His subsequent Herculean acts of daring, which frequently ended in crashes, were bolstered by his brilliant mastery of self-promotion. In 1974, after seven years of painstaking planning, the 35-year-old Knievel attempted to jump Idaho's Snake River Canyon, but crash-landed. His judgment was even more impaired when it came to money and women; he spent far more than the millions he'd earned and during his 38-year marriage had relations with more than 2,000 women (at least according to first-time author Barker's speculations). He spent six months in prison on assault charges and in 1981, pursued by the IRS for tax evasion, vanished for several years. Encouraged by '70s nostalgia, a hip replacement and a liver transplant, Knievel came out of hiding in his mid-50s long enough to enjoy the media spotlight. Rock operas, roller coasters and bendable action figures notwithstanding, his self-feted accomplishments were more than matched by the mess he made of his life. But Barker earnestly provides a sympathetic spin by noting that Knievel's greatest stunts occurred during a time in American history when people badly needed a hero and an escape from the depressing events. Keen and compassionate. (Kirkus Reviews)