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

by Carl Hiaasen (Author)
Key Phrases: course rating, downhill lie, rescue club, The Downhill Lie, Quail Valley, Mind Drive (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Hiaasen (Skinny Dip), an admittedly woeful golfer, recounts his clumsy resumption of the game after a 32-year layoff. Why did he take up golf so long after quitting at the age of 20? I'm one sick bastard, he writes. Hiaasen interweaves passages about his return to the game with diary entries covering more than a year and a half on the links. He mixes childhood memories of playing with his father, who died prematurely, with anecdotes, including the time he and a friend ejected an invasion of poisonous toads from his friend's patio with short irons. His analysis of his lessons, hapless rounds and gimmicky golf equipment is hilarious, and his vivid descriptions are vintage Hiaasen, such as golf balls that are designed to run like a scalded gerbil. Hiaasen also touches on topics he writes about in his novels and newspaper columns, lamenting the overdevelopment of Florida and skewering crooked politicians and lobbyists prone to lavish golf junkets. He finishes his journey with a detailed round-by-round account of his pitiful play in a member-guest tournament on his home course (his discouragement is cheered, however, when his wife and young son joyfully take up the game). With the satirically skilled Hiaasen, who rarely breaks 90 on the links, this narrative is an enjoyable ride. (May)
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From Booklist
“In the summer of 2005, I returned to golf after a much-needed layoff of thirty-two years.” Any golfer knows that those words are a prescription for disaster. And any fiction reader knows that if it’s Carl Hiaasen speaking, the disaster will be not just disastrous but also hysterically, sublimely, surreally funny. And so it is, as recounted in diary form by the fiftysomething Hiaasen, whose gimpy knees and loopy swing consistently undercut the score-lowering results promised by the high-tech gimcracks and expensive clubs he gamely employs in the ongoing search for that elusive breakthrough. What makes Hiaasen’s 577-day diary of hopes denied and dreams deferred so appealing is its everyman aspect: average golfers have a lifetime of frustrations to match Hiaasen’s telescoped experience, and if we don’t have a cadre of famous kibitzers like writer Mike Lupica and golf broadcaster David Feherty to alternately ridicule and support our efforts, we do have our own inner demons, consistently overruling our attempts at positive thinking. Hiaasen, turning serious for a moment while watching his young son pounding away on the driving range, muses, “I believe this is how you’re supposed to feel with a golf club in your hands: Full of heart and free of mind.” Unfortunately, his painfully truthful account reveals all too clearly that “constricted of heart and tangled of mind” more accurately describes what most of us feel as we prepare to swing. --Bill Ott

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 224 pages
• Publisher: Knopf; 1 edition (May 6, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0307266532
• ISBN-13: 978-0307266538
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 4.9 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (63 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #85,984 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

21 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "One day you're suckered into self-confidence [by] a few decent shots; the next, you can't hit the green with a sledgehammer.", May 10, 2008

By	Mary Whipple (New England) - See all my reviews (TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)

Returning to golf thirty-two years after he gave it up, Carl Hiaasen, author of hilarious mysteries, shares his struggles to relearn the game of golf and maybe, even, learn to have fun with it. Golf is not a natural "fit" for Hiaasen--"I was just as restless, consumed, unreflective, fatalistic, and emotionally unequipped to play golf in my fifties as I was in my teens," he admits. He starts "on the path to perdition" in November, 2002, when Sports Illustrated asks him to go to Barbados to write a humorous piece about the photo shoot for the swimsuit issue, and he ends up playing golf with his editor during the downtime.

Unfortunately, for Hiaasen, he plays well enough that he decides to play golf (with second-hand clubs) back home with friends, and soon gets caught up in the golf-mania of finding the perfect equipment, reading books by gurus like Bob Rotella, David Leadbetter, and legend Harvey Penick, subscribing to golf magazines, and buying anything that may improve his game--from pendants to wear around his neck (to reduce stress) to capsules of herbal supplements (to improve concentration).

Describing himself as a "reclusive, neurotic, doubt-plagued duffer," he keeps a diary for almost six hundred days, obsessively recording, often in salty language and off-the-wall imagery, the rounds he plays with his friends, including Mike Lupica and CBS's David Feherty. Admitting that he suffers from "Wildly Unrealistic Expectations," he reflects the fears and frustrations of all beginning golfers when he 1) has to play in front of strangers, 2) has to play a new course for the first time, and 3) agrees to play in his first tournament.

On a more universal note, he continues his mockery of politicians for failing to protect the environment in Florida, a theme of many of his mysteries, and he talks about the growth of golf communities and the loss of animal habitats. He reminds the reader, however, that golf courses are not all bad--they could have been "two thousand, zero lot-line houses." Hilarious in his descriptions of his efforts to learn the game, he is also serious about his frustrations with it. He suffers, he tells us from "the most corrosive fundamental of golf, the S*ck Factor." When his wife and seven-year-old son take lessons and love the game, Hiaasen is reminded of his own golf experiences with his father, and despite his "own foolish and overwrought tribulations," he begins to see "warmer days ahead." Perhaps he might grow to love the game and share it with his family. n Mary Whipple

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5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Quite funny, May 21, 2008

By	Roger Mees - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This memoir and Franz Lidz's even wittier Fairway to Hell: Around the World in 18 Holes are the two funniest golf books I have ever read (and I have read just about every book written on golf). Curiously, Downhill Lie and Fairway were published almost simultaneously. Hiaasen does more than keep a diary about his midlife return to the game. It's a cleverly written and sometimes wistful look at golf, marriage, human nature and life. During his preparation (more than 500 days) for a country club tournament, Hiassen sinks a golf cart into a lake. He uses his golf clubs as a weapon against aggressive rats and takes "focus inducing" Mind Drive capsules. He sees an alligator sunning himself near a fairway as a good omen, but has a less-than-cosmic experience with a Q-Link, a pendant "that was said to hold marvelous powers." He brags about in his good scores, frets about the upcoming member-guest tournament at a Vero Beach, Fla., course, and amuses his golf instructors during lessons. He remembers his time playing golf with his father, and revels in his son's interest -- and talent -- in golf. But more often than not, Hiaasen turns his wit on himself, endearing himself to hackers young and old. If you enjoy Downhill Lie, you'll positively love Fairway To Hell. I highly recommend both.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Enjoyed this Book, March 20, 2009

By	07mom09 - See all my reviews

I am one of those people who have "fun" playing golf. I am married to a golfer like Mr. Hiaasen, who can't see the fun in it. I found his accounts of coming back to the game hilarious and insightful.