Dan Jenkins' second best-known novel, Baja Oklahoma, features the vibrant and tough protagonist Juanita Hutchins. She can cuss and politically commentate with the best of Jenkins' male protagonists. Still convincingly female, and in no way dumb or girly, the fortyish Juanita serves drinks to the colorful crew at Herb's Cafe in South Fort Worth.

She worries herself sick over a hot-to-trot daughter too fond of drugs and the dealers who sell them. She endures a hypochondriac mother whose whinings would justify murder. Juanita dates a fellow middle-ager whose connections with the oil industry are limited to dipstick duty at his filling station—and, by the way, she also hopes to become a singer-songwriter in the real country tradition of Bob Wills and Willie Nelson.

Though Juanita is way too old to remain a kid with a crazy dream, it doesn't matter much to her. In between handing out longneck beers to customer-acquaintances battling hot flashes and deciding when boyfriend Slick is finally going to get lucky, Juanita keeps jotting down lyrics reflective of hard-won wisdom and setting them to music composed on her beloved Martin guitar.

Too many of her early songwriting results are one-dimensional or derivative, but finally, she hits on something both original and heartfelt: a tribute to her beloved home state, warts and all.