When I started on a career in cuemaking 30 years ago, it seemed simple enough. You just bought a lathe and got started. That may still be true today, but it is only the beginning of a lifetime of trying to find the correct method to make the best cue possible. In the following pages I will attempt to explain what I have learned in the last 30 years and why I make cues the way I do. It's a long story, but it is also an unfinished one, for I have yet to make the perfect cue.