I think I can sum up this book in one number 25% (the percent of the book dedicated to references).
As that number supports, the author clearly has done a great deal of well though research on oil's volatility and that is my main takeaway (that this book adequately describes the factors impacting oils volatility as well as any book can).

The writing was understandable to me and I have a relatively little fiscal background and negligible oil knowledge. The story is written chronologically and as such you can see the same dynamics repeating themselves. This lead to a good deal of redundancy, which usually irritates me. However, in this case I think I justified it as I am hoping that the redundancy will help me remember the key characteristics of the players in this field and people in general.