Cowboy Princess: Life with My Parents-Roy Rogers and Dale Evans

Few members of the baby-boom generation can wax nostalgic about childhood with lines like""Dad occasionally shot skeet and trap with Clark Gable."" Rogers-Barnett, daughter of Roy Rogers and Dale Evans, the original rhinestone cowboy couple, does just that in an uplifting tribute that will appeal to fans of the duo and that beloved coffee-drinking palomino, Trigger (""In Dad's case it was love at first sight,"" she writes of the horse). There's no Hollywood dish or childhood trauma worthy of the talk shows here. Instead, this warm, breezy memoir reads like an invitation to a casual supper on the ranch with Rogers and Evans's brood: five children, including the author, were adopted and two were from Rogers's previous marriage (Evans's son was an adult by then). The one child of the marriage, Robin, was born with Down Syndrome and died at five of encephalitis. The ordeal, the author explains, reinforced Roy and Dale's commitment to abandoned and disabled children, and this advocacy remained strong until their deaths. In between recounting a youth spent on soundstages amid Hollywood cowboys and characters like George""Gabby"" Hayes, Rex Allen and The Cisco Kid, Rogers-Barnett offers a tender glimpse of the real people behind her parents' flashy duds and western warbles. Roy appears as a kinetic and musically gifted man from humble beginnings, a devoted father who had trouble showing his feelings even in times of crisis, while Dale is presented as a big-hearted Texas spitfire who talked straight but never learned to boil water or thread a needle. While Rogers-Barnett points out that life in the spotlight wasn't all happy trails, she appears to have few complaints. 75 b&w photos