Of Roughnecks & Riches: A Start-Up in the Great American Fracking Boom

Of Roughnecks & Riches follows Dan Doyle's account of starting a fracking company during America's energy boom. Doyle reflects on the business landscape beneath fracking's public debate—one marked by risk, resilience, greed, and grace alongside what he describes as unrelenting madness. Doyle examines his own role in the company's early failures, tracing them to his entrepreneurial nature: a tendency toward hurried, overly zealous decisions made with the assumption he will land on his feet. He questions this cavalier approach while acknowledging it as inherent to entrepreneurship itself—a group he characterizes as marked by bullheadedness, resistance to authority, and a preference for difficulty over ease and naivety over experience. The book offers a firsthand account of the energy revolution that has transformed the nation and world.