So help me golf Why we love the game

How is it that Reilly--hands down, the funniest golf writer alive--started out hating the game? It's not a funny story. As a child, Reilly knew that when his alcoholic father returned from a day at the links, he'd be hammered and looking for something to hit besides a golf ball. It took years for Reilly to overcome that formidable barrier to the links, but when he did, he was hooked, first as a player and then as a writer: "Writing about golf," he learned, "was really just writing about people who happened to play golf. And that meant there were stories everywhere." We read plenty of those stories and meet a wealth of those people in this delightful recap of a life spent on and around golf courses of every stripe, but it's the raunchiest public courses that Reilly treasures most, especially for the denizens who haunt them, like Two-Down O'Connor, the "World's Most Avid Golf Gambler." Reilly keeps coming back to the people, and who can blame him when their stories mix funny and ironic with inspirational in a perfect blend of sweet and sour? Take Ricky Meissner, a "Tour Rabbit" who spent most of his playing career missing cuts and going broke until he decided to rob a bank whenever he missed a cut. It worked until it didn't.

The acclaimed sports journalist journeys to the heart of a unique sport and pastime. To the uninitiated, golf looks like an undertaking of dubious purpose conducted with tools badly designed for the task. Longtime ESPN and Sports Illustrated writer Reilly, who has spent much of his life playing, watching, and writing about the game, feels only pity for those poor fools. He loves the sport's mix of tension and calmness, its social nature, and the rich history of famous courses. Most of all, he loves golf's democratic nature. Every player has an equal chance, and even royalty can wilt when faced with the little white ball. The game doesn't care who it humiliates, although it can also supply moments of clarity, grace, and beauty. Reilly ably captures all of these elements, mixing in sketches of iconic players and colorful figures. He admits to being obsessive about the minutiae of the game, and the book is punctuated with odd lists and sidebars, including a list of 30 random facts about Jack Nicklaus. This extends into Reilly's collection of weird holes around the world--e.g., one in South Africa that has a pit of alligators or a par 3 in the Dominican Republic "that's 98% water." Throughout, the author interweaves his personal story, noting that golf probably saved him from depression and chronic anxiety. He has little time for people who decry golf as elitist (the vast majority of games are played on public courses) and who describe tennis as better for fitness (it isn't). He also has some snarky things to say about Donald Trump's gaudy courses, arguing that their deliberate artificiality misses the point. Reilly believes that in the past few years, golf has emerged (or, more accurately, reemerged) as a cool game, attracting a new generation of players. Golf might be played initially out of curiosity and thereafter in a futile quest for revenge, but people will probably still be whacking balls down fairways 1,000 years from now. An informative, enjoyable romp. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.