Black Buck opens with the self-described “author” of the text, Buck, telling readers that, if they follow his advice, they can achieve the financial success and self-empowerment that he has attained. At the end of the text, we discover that he is in jail. How does this revelation change your reading of the novel? What do you think that Darren/Buck’s imprisonment means in relation to the ideas of self-empowerment and achieving success that he espouses?

This book intentionally blurs the lines between literary fiction and nonfiction categories like business and self-development. Do you think that Darren/Buck is a character to emulate in real life? Are the lessons set forth in this “cautionary memoir” ones that we should attempt to implement? How should we think about the relationship between real life and fiction in this text?

At the end of the book, Darren claims, “I am locked up in a cage but I never been freer” (380). Earlier, he noted, “Nothing in life is free, especially freedom” (346). What do you think “freedom” means, as described in these quotes and elsewhere in the book? What kind of “freedom” does Darren have, and what is the price that he has paid for it?