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The Downhill Lie: A Hacker's Return to a Ruinous Sport

By Mark Graham, Special to the Rocky

Published May 8, 2008 at 7 p.m.

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* Nonfiction. By Carl Hiaasen. Knopf, $22. Grade: B+

Book in a nutshell: Despite his occasional harangues against golf resorts for spoiling Florida's ecology, Miami Herald columnist and popular novelist Hiaasen chronicles his attempt to master the game of golf after a 32-year hiatus.

The author tries to explain what prompted him to take on this challenge early in the book when he says, "What possesses a man to return in midlife to a game at which he'd never excelled in his prime, and which in fact had dealt him mostly failure, angst and exasperation?

"Here's why I did it: I'm one sick bastard."

He goes on to explain the nostalgia he feels about the times he and his late father, an accomplished golfer, spent on the course and the pleasure he might find with his own young son. From this point on, the reader shares Hiaasen's frustration, nearly day-by-day for two years, as he tries to best the score of 88 he achieved as a young man.

Best tidbit: Along the way, Hiaasen purchased and tried numerous gimmicks he found advertised in golf's many magazines. None of the pills or amulets seemed to provide much help. The only real positive results he got from these panaceas was that he succeeded in killing two of three rats he found in his shed with a Momentus Swing Trainer: "basically a foreshortened 6-iron that's weighted heavily to build muscle strength. It has a molded grip for the hands, a sturdy steel shaft, and it tips the scale at a formidable 40 ounces - a full half-pound heavier than Barry Bonds' baseball bat." One lucky rodent escaped and disappeared into the shrubbery.

Pros: Any golfer on the downward side of middle age will be able to picture himself in the author's soft-spiked shoes. And the foibles and embarrassments, as well as the joys, of casual and tournament golf ring true.

Cons: Recounting shot after shot for 200 pages can't help but be just a bit redundant. Though pretty humorous at times, Hiaasen's odyssey on the links is not as funny as I expected.

Final word: Golfers should love this book. Hiaasen's fans who don't golf, however, will likely be disappointed.