It has taken Carl Hiaasen to capture the essence of a game that, like the bagpipes and the kilt, was invented by the Irish and given to the Scots as a joke. The rest is history, and this wretched pastime has demented us since.
David Feherty
 

'Every weekend, thousands of otherwise rational men and women are cursing, kicking at divots and smashing expensively milled putters against the trunks of immovable hardwood trees. These players go home in a toxic funk to inflict gloom upon their loved ones until the following Saturday, when they rush back to the golf course and do it all over again.'

In the summer of 2005, Carl Hiaasen picked up a golf club again for the first time in 32 years. He was not the best of players in 1973, and had certainly not got any younger in the intervening period. Undeterred, and weighed down by an increasing quantity of golf equipment and game-enhancing products acquired from adverts on The Golf Channel, who can see a sucker coming, Carl was soon hacking and shanking his way around the courses of Florida, and his obsession with the sport was rekindled. Animals were harmed during the making of this book.

Over the course of the next 18 months, Carl's game got better, then worse, then slightly better, then much worse again, and he even managed to jinx Tiger Woods. On the way to finally summoning up the courage to compete in an actual tournament himself, Carl details the hilarious consequences of his misguided belief that he could actually play the game. We also learn that Justin Timberlake has a better golf handicap (6) than Bob Dylan (17), that Eagle Trace golf course contains not one trace of an eagle, and that Mind Drive capsules are not necessarily a good idea.

But through all the misery and frustration (save the odd glorious shot), golf took up residence in Carl's heart again. Fairway to Hell is the ultimate tale of the trials and tribulations of the amateur golfer, but also the heart-warming story of how the game brought together the generations of the Hiaasen family.

[Hiaasen] displays a fine-tuned sense of the absurd... it brims with golf mania
The New York Times

Hiaasen is shameless in extracting every bit of comedic value he possibly can. Essentially, he does so by poking fun at himself and that is what 'hacking' is all about. The laughs may be cheap but they are ever so painfully earned
James Corrigan Independent

Hiaasen's hilarious misadventures on the golf course are all too familiar to anyone who has ever flailed at the ball in futile attempts to conquer a sport that mercilessly strips us of our dignity
The New York Times Book Review

A wonderful return to the magic (albeit voodoo) that is Carl Hiaasen... with the sport of golf providing the venue for his unique wit and biting humor... you'll have many laugh-out-loud moments
Decatur Daily

A funny, behind-the-scenes excursion into the angst-ridden world of a man with average golfing skills
Georgetown Record

A cleverly written, witty and sometimes wistful look at golf, marriage, human nature and life
The Tampa Tribune

The foibles and embarrassments, as well as the joys, of casual and tournament golf ring true. Golfers should love this book
Rocky Mountain News

Hiaasen's observations can be both accurate and funny, a rare gift for what qualifies as a genuine sports book because it will have great resonance amongst Sunday morning hackers
Peter Sharkey Yorkshire Post

Brimming wit
Robert Collins Sunday Times

With biting humor and painfully honest self-humiliation, Hiaasen describes his 1-1/2-year journey into one of Dante's inner circles of hell
Christian Science Monitor

Memoir is new territory for him, but Hiaasen is Hiaasen. Fans of his bizarro novels will find his irony and sense of humor remain unaffected on the links
The Florida Times-Union

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