AUTOS CARS CUSTOM

Tim, he's great guy, and read a bit about him at the end of this post to be truly amazed at how diverse his talents are, is also a kids book author. Sharing his humor and enjoyment of concept car designs with kids, he's made up 36 hot rod rides/ goofy fun car ideas that you've heard of perhaps, but not seen on paper.

You've heard of a snot rocket, and a gumballer... but not like the above!

In categories that range from Big Boomers, ElecTricks, HugeSters, Tiny Racers, Teeny Rockets, World Travelers and Yum Sters... these concepts are fun and entertaining... even topical to the "Green" "Solar" and "Electric" movements

Kids and adults like me will get a kick out of this book, but of course teens are going through a phase where they probably can't admit the book has cute stuff in it. Oh well. It's available at Amazon   http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1933492813/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=1933492813&linkCode=as2&tag=starwarscust-20 (Check out the reviews here, all positive!)

and Barnes and Noble
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/fireball-tims-big-book-of-wacky-rides-fireball-tim/1112860273?ean=9781933492810

and a portion of the proceeds goes to help the rescue and care of discarded puppy mill breeding dogs http://milldogrescue.org/

Meet the Author

Fireball Tim is Hollywood's go-to guy for wild and wacky rides. His creative thought and design, TV shows and toys populate kids' rooms around the world, spurring fun and zany ideas among many. From Hot Rods to Custom Cars, Movie Cars to Muscle Cars, Fireball Tim has done them all with youthful enthusiasm and inspiration.

 Fireball Tim has built an extensive and unique career in the film industry having designed vehicles, weaponry, props, costumes and environments for hundreds of major features, TV and commercials.

 Among Fireball's 350 credits include stints as a designer for Walt Disney Imagineering from 1991-93 and Universal Studios Theme Park to movies like "Priest," "Gone in 60 Seconds," "Batman," "Monster Garage," "Jurassic Park," "GI Joe," "Knight Rider" and "The Avengers."

Though Fireball Tim is constantly in demand as an Automotive Design Expert, AutoBlogger and Journalist, he is most sought now as an Automotive TV Host with many appearances on the Discovery Network and Speed Channel including "World's Most Expensive Rides," "Extreme Rides" and "Street Tuner Challenge."

His company, Fireball Tim Worldwide, is the world's only Hollywood Automotive Lifestyle Brand, encompassing design and entertainment to which he hosts, designs and travels extensively for shows, plus raising awareness for sustainable products like Lifetime Oil Filter.

He is an icon in the Automotive Social Network scene, attending a couple dozen events a year like SEMA in Las Vegas (saw him there last year!) .  His endeavors also include Design and Children's Books and Toys. Under his previous company, Toystore Films, Fireball became an accomplished award winning actor/director for independent films and commercials.

by the number (thank you John for that phrase!)
20 Chapters
122 pieces of paper between the covers

Quality photos. Well, this is my usual location to tell you how many hi def, hi res color images you'll find... normally I have to count between old black and white and new hi res hi def. Not this time. Every single photo is a stunning image by Peter Harholdt and without getting every car into a controlled studio environment. Amazing photographer, stunning photos that earn your respect as delivering on your expectations that were formed when seeing the cover, and reading the title

But you aren't reading this review to see that I think it's a deal. You already know I ain't gonna waste your time with a book I don't like and recommend.

So what's inside that's got my admiration? Photos of hot rods that are awesome, both the photos and the hot rods.

You'll think that some of these are museum quality, of course they are. But the So Cal Speedshop Belly tanker wasn't built to be a museum piece. Neither was the So Cal Speedshop 3 window "Kong", the Norman Timbs Special, James Hetfield's 37 Ford 5 window coupe by Rick Dore, the Nuemeister 29 roadster, the Bell 303 Crankshaft Special, the Berardini Bros deuce roadster, the Dick Flint 29 roadster, Eddie Dye's 29 Roadster, the Doane Spencer deuce roadster, and Billy Gibbons' 66 Chevelle and 35 pickup are most definitely not museum cars. They are frequently near museums... http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2011/02/nhra-museum-in-pomona-has-rat-rod-out.html  as the 35 truck was at the front of the Wally Parks NHRA Museum during the 2011 Grand National Roadster Show.

Not museum cars in this book. Not Chip Foose cars. Not Boyd Coddington's cars.

See the connection? Well maybe not yet.

The book is 20 interviews/write ups from Ken Gross (ought to be given a doctorate in hot rods and writing in my opinion, he's all that and a tank of nitro) when he went around the US and got talking with car makers and put into each chapter the interview, opinions, and pages of photos of the cars they've made. Not every one, but ones that you can see demonstrate the masters touch at building, restoring, painting and designing hot rods.

Ridler winners? Probably a couple in here. Out of the 20 builders, a couple have won the Ridler, and the Grand National Roadster award, and the AMBR award, and other awards. These builders are that exquisite in their finished cars, that perfect in their designs.

You know most of them by name, Troy Trepanier, Rolling Bones, Don Orosco, Pete Chapouris, Roy Brizio, Rick Dore, Posies, Bobby Alloway, Alan Johnson... and maybe you know the others, but they were either new to me, or I don't recognize the names but know the cars. You know.. like the car, never meet the builder? I have a lot of those. Thousands.

Back to the book, you can sum up the feeling I got when reading the interviews, with remembering that way some easy going down to earth type of people have when you get a moment to chat with them. No pretentious or unsettling conversation, just satisfying and enjoyable. Ever talk to some one like that? They are famous, genius or accomplished more than anyone else at their skills, but seem as cool as the guys at work? That's the way the interviews read.

I talk to Gene Winfield every time I see him, just to say hi, and damn it's good to see you again. He's that nice, and so are the guys interviewed here. Vern Tardel is maybe a bit like a "What are you doing here" flathead traditionalist in his interview when approached to be in a book about cars that are this beautiful, but I get the sense he's one of the hardworking old timers that is fed up with Boydsters, people wanting to buy his cache of treasured impossible to find hot rod parts, and fiberglass wanna be's. I got no problem with this approach to hot rodding at all.

The others are a bit more business casual, but all seem to have the deep values of made in the USA, no billet, and master craftsmanship that  you expect from the best in the business. For guys like Trepanier that can make million dollar rides, or 100 thou hot rods... to Don Orosco who went back to the bench to build Ardun Heads and Veda Orr knockoffs... or Chapouris who has Thom Taylor and Chris Frogget doing the artwork to set the wheels in motion.

These are the best, with the most incredibly rich traditional ways of not knocking the competition, regarding the 40's and 50's ways of building, and making cars ride like bimmers and benzs when it's apropos.

How they took such great photos without a studio is demonstrated at http://lowreysautorestoration.com/coverage/hotrodart.html

By the numbers
 5 chapters
129  pieces of paper between the covers

 Quality photos: about 378 (I may have miscounted a couple) 232 are color photos. Regardless of color or black and white, the images are outstanding and high quality

 Period ads: none, but plenty of period publicity photos. Good ones. Plus plenty of design sketches and drawings

Something that is important to remember when reviewing this book, the primary focus of it was information and photos NOT in the authors previous 4 Corvette books, and the other best Corvette books on the market. It makes it less simple to judge the book based on information you might be looking for but not finding, as that might be very well left out intentionally if published in "Corvette 50 years".

form and layout
Lots of photos per page to illustrate the text.

Chapters
1 In the Beginning, the birth of the Corvette
    the design process, the prototypes, and the mistakes made

2 Domination to Disco, the 2nd and 3rd generation Vettes

3 Reclaiming the throne, the 4th, 5th, 6th generations

4 Racing, Beating the worlds best

5 Community action, the people and places

what do I know about Vettes not covered in the book
  Most expensive, most rare, and stats like that. This book has each model stat by engines, convertible vs hardtop, etc, and purchase price.

things I learned that I did not know
 The author, Randy, has 4 books previous to this on Corvettes. I'd say that makes him an expert. Randy has 130 Corvette books in his collection, and unknown amounts of magazines
  The breakdown of options that customers preferred, as in, the most ordered option, the most ordered color, the least desired option almost no-one bought.
 Duntov's rocky road and near firing when working at GM. Intriguing reading of how GM design, engineering, and management mishandled the Corvette.

overall impression
  Thoroughly well done, you're getting more than your dollars worth with this book. It's a damn good book, a damn fine written documentary, and exhaustively researched look at the Corvette history

Surprise
  The last chapter on the Corvette specific car shows, websites, car clubs. Very cool to see this in a book, as most authors ignore the mundane reality of what happens when a car is in use, by it's owner. Randy did a great job of telling the history of the Carlisle event, the NCCC, etc plus websites dedicated to the Vette

Complaints
 I had hoped the engine designations would be explained so they are understandable ie: L71, L79, L36, L68 etc etc
 The 4 sidebars of the V-8 engine, isn't that a good clue that you should have made a chapter on the engines, power trains, and engineering, instead of breaking into the chapter storyline like a news bulletin?
  Editing was not good (I'm self editting for years, and it's easy to criticize if you can tell how to improve it) and print on pages 98 and 103 was blurry (printed in China)
 The U-6S was mentioned once, but never explained, (so I still don't know if it meant the paint, turbo, or outsourced engineering)  page 135
an example of how Google book search works:
http://books.google.com/books?id=qgFK7fwC9v0C&pg=PA135&lpg=PA135&dq=rpo+%22u-6s%22+corvette&source=bl&ots=STRzuPP-Bw&sig=0cJmvbgvanjOPxGvXpSyF3ogj_I&hl=en&sa=X&ei=RpkdUKqmKKyujAKU3IGABA&ved=0CD0Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=U-6s&f=false

I don't like the "Continued on page ..." format when I'm reading. I read books, and that's not the way to make a good book. Take all the interruptions, and make a chapter of them. A chapter on Zora Duntov alone would have been a good editing choice, instead of interspersing information about his moments throughout the other chapters

In this book, the interruptions of the storyline are all the biographies of the guys, and some design sidebars, that made the Corvette happen in many ways, those are great. No complaint about the number, quality of research, editing, or plethora of information ... just the inappropriate locations that are out of context, and better off as a chapter to themselves

Sidebars

Bios: Sloan, Earl, Duntov, Mitchell, McLellan

Design: The Blue Flame engine, Corvettes in American culture (x2), fiberglas, the V-8(4 sidebars), fuel injection, 63 Split Window inspiration, acronyms of the body models, smog legislation, factory show cars, Callaway Vettes, production numbers by year chart, product change vs model longevity (engrossing and thought provoking), the 2013 model convertible news, CERV I, CERV II, Grand Sport, pace car editions, Le Mans,

For a terrific interview with the author, from the experts on Corvettes, Vette Magazine http://www.vetteweb.com/lifestyle/vemp_1204_corvette_history_0_to_60_years/index.html

Price, about 30 dollars from various retailers on Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Corvette-Sixty-Years-Randy-Leffingwell/dp/0760342318/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1344118702&sr=8-1&keywords=corvette+60+years

by the numbers
5 chapters
92 pieces of paper between the covers, none blank, none wasted

The form and layout are fine. There is so much to cover and space isn't wasted, only 6 pages are text only, all the rest are both pictures and text.

High quality photos, about half are new, and half vintage photographs. 100 black and white, 135 color

No complaints at all. Since it isn't possible to show a photo of every car, truck, bike, and airplane that Steve McQueen ever had, as I think probably half were likely never photographed, though I'd like to see more photos of the vehicles I don't think that is realistic to expect we will ever find a more complete collection of them than this book.

the chapters divide the book into McQueen's Garage, Screen, Track, Two Wheels, and Enduring Legacy

The 1st chapter covers the '53 Siata 208s, the '58 Porsche Speedster 1600 super, the '57 Jaguar XK/SS, the '63 Ferrari 250 Lusso, the '67 Mini Cooper S, a single photo of a 66 Vette tail and it's whereabouts are unknown, the '67 Ferrari 275 GTS/4 NART Spyder (one of 10 built), Jeep CJ that Von Dutch pinstriped, '69 Porsche 911S, the '52 Hudson Wasp, and has a more brief look and text about the '49 Cadillac series 62, the '57 Bel Air, the 50's 3100 series Chevy truck, and both a '57 and a '68 Ford truck.

Then only text to list the half track Army surplus that he left with Von Dutch in Arizona, a '51 Hudson Hornet, a 53 Allard with a hemi, a '49 Cadillac 4 dr, a '31 Lincoln Club Sedan, a '35 Chrysler Airflow, a '30 Cadillac coupe, a WW2 Willys Jeep, and 3 Packards: a '39 Super 8 four door sedan, a rare Super 8 convertible coupe, and a '40 series 120 convertible coupe.

Mentioned, and with a couple photos are Steve's airplanes, a '41 and '45 Boeing Stearman, and a 1930's  PA-8 Pitcairn Mailwing,

Chapter 2 goes into detail and photos about Steve's movies and movie vehicles, The Great Escape, The Thomas Crown Affair, Bullitt, The Reivers, On Any Sunday, Le Mans, and The Hunter.

Chapter 3 Focuses on Steve's racing before movies, and later in 1968 with the Hurst Baja Boots, in 1969 at Ascot raceway, and Riverside and Sebring in 1970

Chapter 4 gets into Steve's passion for motorcycles, showing photos of 20 of them, and talking about them in great detail.

A Honda CA77 Dream Touring, a Triumph 650, a '46 Indian Chief, a Husqvarna 400 Cross, a '59 Triumph Bonneville, a 1914 Indian Model F boardtrack racer, a 1919 Indian Daytona Twin racer, the 1929 Scott Super Squirrel that Von Dutch restored and I've featured before, a '64 Triumph TR6 ISDT, Honda CR250 Elsinore, 1921 Indian dirt track racer, and his WW1 era Harley Davidson, a mid 1910's Pope, and 1926 Fowler

Chapter 5 is brief, and talks about the legacy Steve McQueen has, how the Bullitt movie was merchandised into Bullitt Mustangs, in both 2001 and 2008 by Ford... how the image of Steve has been used in cool tv commercials, etc.

You finish this book knowing you've had a thorough look at how Steve McQueen's movies and racing combined with the lifestyle and outgoing nature of his racing and motorcycle off roading made him one of the few ultimate car guys. The ones who can buy anything, race - restore - or collect, and decide to have the coolest and most useful cars, trucks, bikes and things that aren't going to just be dusted off and left on battery minders.

Probably the best book you'll find on Steve McQueen's passion for vehicles. Enjoy! 

That introduction nails it. So much that I had to post it... so you'd understand what I love about the reason for this book, which I hope is the first of a series.

by the numbers
5 chapters
116 pieces of paper between the covers, 232 sides, only 3 blank

The form and layout are nice, good presentation, with medium quality photos due to the fact they are vintage photographs scanned and transferred to digital. Some black and white, mostly color

the only thing I'd say in a negative way is the "magazine style" call out quotes that fill half a page to get your attention. What is that for? It's a book! The reader is already engrossed and hooked! Magazines need it to get you to buy the copy, books are a thing you are already committed to, and this book doesn't need to screw around, it's terrific and you'll just be reading the small print and ignoring the callouts

Photos: 89 color images, 32 black and white.

the chapters divide the book into types of people, so you could skip right to the type of people that interest you most... Racers, Titans of the Auto Industry, Stars of stage screen sound, Athletes, Journalists artist and others

The only things that might make this book better would be if the author took more time to talk to every one with an interest in cars, and published more stories. This book is primarily the first cars of celebs and famous people you may not have heard of, but will agree are well known for their accomplishments. I don't know why the same interesting stories wouldn't come from people who aren't famous, or from specific genres of vehicles, like the first 4 x 4, race cars, Vespa, Harley, etc etc

Cost, starts at about 11 dollars on Amazon http://www.amazon.com/My-First-Car-Recollections-Stewart/dp/0760335346 that is a bargain deal for the enjoyment you'll get for a book this full of interesting stuff

Things I learned from this book:
If you want to score big bucks, find the cars these stars once had, they want them back badly
Patrick Dempsey (tv and movie star) had a Porsche that was the sound source for the Top Gun scenes with Kelly McGillis' speedster
Mario Andretti's first race car was a Hudson Hornet
Sir Stirling Moss' first car was a Morgan 3 wheeler
John Glenn's first car was a 29 roadster
Chad Knaus was crew chiefing at age 14 for his dad, and went on to be the first crew chief to win 4 consecutive NASCAR championships (driver Jimmie Johnson)
Enzo Ferrari bought his son a Morris Mini partly from admiration for the designer, Alec Issigonis (photo of Alec and Enzo http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2010/02/cool-photography-site-spirted-drive.html)
Barry Meguiar and Mario Andretti had 57 Chev Bel Airs as their first car
McKeel Hagerty's sister had a Corvair Lakewood station wagon for a first car that Augie Pabst used to ice race, and McKeel's first car was a 1967 911S that he was driving in high school.
Bill Warner (Amelia Island Concours founder and chairman) used to try beating his time from Charelston to Jacksonville, and was going so fast he passed a state trooper who was already in pursuit of another car
Jay Leno's parents once dropped everything to get to where Jay had parked at school to put a tarp over his truck to prevent the rain from ruining the interior (What cool people!)
A kill switch to stop the car while driving a date home is a cool trick to get some extra cuddle time
Robert Wagner (Hart to Hart actor) had a deuce roadster that he ran on the dry lakes in the late 40's at 109mph
Andy Warhohl never had a first car til age 56
NBC found Johnny Carson's first car, had it restored and gave it to him for a birthday present
Steve McQueen entered motorcycle races under the pseudonym Henry Mushman so no one would know ahead of the race that he'd be in it
Paul Newman's first car was a 29 Ford, followed by a 37 Packard, but just as cool... hopped up a vw bug with a 1800cc Porsche engine for his daily commuter from Connecticut to New York
Dan Ackroyd used to have fun with friends pulling each other behind a car on snowy roads
Eric Bana will be getting the Beast in action again, it's been fixed and is ready for paint
the TV shows "Rides" and "Overhaulin" are both the creation of Bud Brutsman, who left home at age 15, just after his dad had tried to get him involved in a father son car project, a 1969 Mach 1
Boom Boom Mancini is the nephew of musician composer Henry Mancini
Bruce Jenner (76 Olympics decathalon gold medalist) had a 54 Caddy hearse as hid first car, and raced professionally for Roush on the IMSA circuit in the 80s, and had a GTO class win at Sebring in 86
Morgan Freeman ran into the side of a bus with his first car, decided to never drink and drive again, but he did in 2008, big news event http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2009/nov/05/records-morgan-freeman-settles-car-wreck-lawsuit/?partner=RSS

Here is the list of people that Matt got stories from

The author, Matt Stone, also wrote other auto books of note, McQueen's Machines (still waiting for me to get it reviewed) The Ferrari Phenomenon, and Winning (The racing life of Paul Newman) is interviewed by a local tv station http://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2011/07/27/author-matt-stone-details-the-memories-of-my-first-car/

Or you can stop by his website and learn that he has been in auto journalism since 1990, worked at Motor Trend for a long time, also freelanced a lot (I've seen his name in many of the Source Interlink magazines I think) and was editor of the superb first run of Motor Trend Classic (you really would love to have those!) http://www.mattstonecars.com/bio.html and just started a blog two weeks ago http://mattstonecars.com/blog/

For more first car stories: http://editorial.autos.msn.com/my-first-car

the inside cover shot is terrific, and that is the way the rest of the book carries on, it's terrific.

The author, Colin Comer, is an enthusiast, researcher, racer, and owner of a couple Cobras, perhaps sequentially and not simultaneously... but I point out that this author is not just a research book writer. His basic bio and reason for writing comprise the preface pages. His website: http://www.colinsclassicauto.com/

Starting with the origins of Carroll Shelby's drive and ambition to make a sports car, http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2009/05/possibly-earliest-shelby-sports-sars.html for the ads for his sprts car dealership mentioned in the book, the where and how fall into place through the first chapter, which though focusing on Carroll, aslo spotlights Ed Hugus, race car driver, and thoroughly partnering with Carroll from the beginning as the first Cobra dealership, and used his "Spot" at LeMans to get a Cobra into the race. Could anyone be more helpful to a startup sportscar maker?
Phil Remington also gets a spotlight http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2011/07/phil-remington-last-of-soup-to-nuts.html

In the book a passing mention is made of Carroll's most famous personal Cobras, the dual supercharged 427 http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2007/01/carroll-shelbys-personal-cobra-sells.html


Chapter 2 gets thoroughly into the early racing, drivers, and events.
As you can see by the pages I've used here, the book averages 3 to 4 photos per page... I love that.
 I thought I knew a good amount about Cobras, http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/search/label/Cobra but with the connections, collectors, experts, drivers and owners the author learned from, he has liberally stuffed twice as much info I've never seen before into this book throughout the article and captions as I expected. It's a treasure of knowledge... simply astonishing. If you can only recollect all you'll learn from this book you'd be able to converse with any Cobra enthusiast
For example, you're likely already familiar with the CSX numbering, and various Cobra types, but I learned of the CS, COX, and COS Cobras for the first time. You see, CSX doesn't even come close to being what I thought it stood for, I thought it was Carroll Shelby Experimental. What a good guess! But it really is C for 3rd series Ace manufacturing, S is for Shelby (the Ace customer) and X is for Export.

I brought that up to show there is always more to learn, and to help with explaining CS were Cobras that weren't exported out of England, And COB and X were CObra Britain and CObra eXport.

This will help to explain the the #3 Cobra in the above right hand photo was the CS2131 and it's sister CS2142 that raced at the 1963 LeMans were not export Cobras

Awesome artgallery photos like the above are all though the book

It's wonderful how many car club members photos from car shows are in to book too



Like I was saying about the amount of information I learned for the first time, were these two coachbuilt customs, the Bordinat Cobras. Above CSX3001 was a bare chassis that went to Detroit Styling, and named the XD Cobra by Ford, the body was a new vacuum-formed plastic material from US Royal. Aint't that amazing? I've never run across any mention of these before! They disappeared into the storage warehouses of the Detoit Historical Museum http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2011/02/i-didnt-know-that-detroit-historical.html in the 1960's, and were found by 30plus year Ford employee and Cobra enthusiast Jeff Burgy. Below is the red CSX2008 called Cougar II by Ford and shown at the 1964 New York Worlds Fair http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/search/label/1964%20Worlds%20Fair

you'll learn about the Dragonsnake Cobras, like the yellow one above (the only factory yellow Cobra) now owned by collector and museum owner Steven Juliano http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2008/11/steven-juliano-collection-im-betting.html
A gallery of the above http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2011/12/cobra-dragonsnake-at-sema.html
A gallery of El Cid: http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2010/02/el-cid-one-of-few-shelby-cobra.html

This book is so damn good, and shows how incredible much info the author knows and shares with the readers, he has many pages about the DragonSnakes (8 made) and photos of at least 6, CSX2019 (Elvis http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/search/label/Elvis used it in a movie then it went back to Shelby American to become the 1st factory DragonSnake), CSX2427 the yellow one, CSX2472 that never did drag race, it was used by it's owner as a street car, then the 2nd owner autocrossed and road raced it, CSX2093, CSX2357, and El Cid CSX2248. The Motion "Kng Cobra" CSX3159 may or may not be an official DragonSnake

There is a chapter on the Corvette vs Cobra competition, chapter 4

For photos of Don and the number 89  http://justacargal-s.blogspot.com/2011/10/coronado-speedfest-pit-personal.html CSX2473 is the #89, I think Don said it was the most winningest, or most raced Cobra


Chapter 5 gets in depth about Cobra collectors and clubs


Chapter 6 has a hell of a good look at the wide variety of memorabilia, brochures, handouts, and merchandising Carroll used for advertising. Below is the 1963 "Snakeskin" dealer kit


I just bust out laughing when I tell people about the "Pit Stop Deoderant" that I've posted about here before,  http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2010/01/1967-shelby-advertising-of-pit-stop_19.html but I've never seen a can of it before.... Colin, you really nailed it! Great find!

 They've got the full story how this 1969 Barracuda, 340, 4 speed but upgraded to a 440 for drag racing and painted in the early 70's came to keep it's cool paint and get out of the barn it was stored in
Yup, it's worth the 6 bucks

In brief, here it is by the numbers
5 chapters
96 pieces of paper between the covers, 192 sides
27 of those sides are blank, have nothing but a caption to the opposite page photo, or are just title pages
25 and about 1/2 sides of paper are text. Total. Good reading, and highly informative yes... but not a lot for 192 sides of paper

The form and layout are nice, good presentation, with high quality photos

Photos: 49 color images, 4 of those were movie posters, 2 were of auctions and not of Steve, 2 magazine covers, and one full page advertisement for Porsche

Biggest disappointment is that the chapter on physical fitness, though a really good informational read, takes up 32 sides of paper and none of those are about the "Passion For Speed" as it relates to vehicles. They are about his workouts, training, exercise. Relates to his ability to endure the driving conditions on motorcycle, race cars, yes I can see that... because he stayed in good shape and the chapter proves it... but I wanted to be receiving pages of Steve and his "Speed" related vehicles in text or photos. Not his home gym and pool photos... to which there are 1.65 sides of paper of text. Yes, of 32 sides in the chapter on his fitness titled "The Body as Tuned Machine" poor grammar there, it has 29.35 sides of paper with black and white photos of Steve working out or swimming. Not good. 22 full sheets of black and white photos of Steve in this chapter, working out with weights 5 photos, 3 with punching bag, 5 misc, 10 swimming or at the pool/hot tub... this is ridiculous, and not what I want in a "Passion for Speed" all from a Time/Life photo shoot. Waste of space in this book.

26 photos of Steve with motorcycles, 4 of those were on the set of the Great Escape.
 4 photos with his Lola T70 at races (I've posted these before, here they are again for reference)
3 photos from the Sports Illustrated car review article in 1966 I posted here http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2009/12/steve-mcqueen-tests-new-gts-of-1966-for.html
2 photos of the Porsche 908 while racing from the 1970 12 hours of Sebring
5 photos from the set of Bullitt (and I haven't seen 4 of them before)
9 photos from the movie Thomas Crown Affair
13 photos from the movie LeMans


Another error was calling a Ford a "Tutor" not a Tudor. Seems like a typo perhaps, but its the same error found in other accounts of the James Dean wreck http://history1900s.about.com/od/1950s/qt/deandies.htm 
 
Things not in the book that belong, the story about tricking the cops into giving him and his wife an escort to the hospital in the Jaguar SS http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2009/05/steve-and-some-of-his-cars.html
 
I don't recall any mention of his time spent talking to, or interacting with Carroll Shelby (who loaned him a Cobra for a couple months to entice a sale), or driving the Cobra (excluding the Sports Illustrated car review article) no mention of Max Balchowsky on the Bullitt Mustang and Charger work, or of Steve's hanging out at Max's "Hollywood Motors" that I read somewhere was connected to his friendship with James Coburn who turned Steve onto Ferrari's and introduced him to Max because Coburn had his sports cars kept up by Max.

No mention of the 1969 Baja race where Steve was co-driving a Hurst Baja Boot. James Garner was also in that race was a friend... and neighbor who Steve would piss off by tossing empty beer cans onto his drive way... and co star (along with James Coburn) in the movie Great Escape

and when you know that Steve owned 210 motorcycles, 55 cars, 5 airplanes... you expect more would have been mentioned and shown.


 
Overall impression of this book...
 
 not worth the money (40 dollars list from the publisher http://www.qbookshop.com/products/194742/9780760342480/Steve-McQueen.html ) but online for about 25 bucks new, less if used. The less you pay the better the trade of your money for the amount of information and entertainment you'll recieve. There have been about 2 dozen books made about Steve McQueen, and a ton of information available online (I've posted lots myself) and this book doesn't compete well enough to justify your time and it's full price cost
 
Not well editted
 22 sides of paper have nothing, or just a caption for the opposite side, too much about French poets, and Japanese philosophers
 
Not well researched / not well filled.
 I've posted many photos of Steve from many sources, and some info and stories http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/search/label/Steve%20McQueen... and this book wasn't filled with the many easily learned things about Steve McQueen and his enthusiasm for racing in buggies, cars, and motorcycles.. too much is missing and so easily found online (like http://www.tv.com/people/steve-mcqueen/trivia/ )
 
This book failed to impress me with the chapter "McQueen's Garage"and wasted 22 sides of paper on photos from a Life or Time magazine gallery of Steve's workout.