The Pro: A Golf Novel [Hardcover]

Mike Shropshire (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 22, 2001

Del Bonnet, a teaching pro at an obscure Florida golf resort, needs a change and needs it badly. Having crossed an ominous threshold-his fiftieth birthday-Bonnet receives frequent communiques from the AARP people. He gazes into the future and sees the prospect of assisted living growing larger by the day.

Serendipity intervenes. A sales rep working out of his station wagon leaves a handmade driver in Bonnet's modest golf shop. The pro privately auditions the driver with astounding results. Bonnet-celebrated for thirty years as the only touring pour to be arrested on the course during a PGA event-is quickly convinced that he has secured possession of no mere golf club, but a sword of salvation. So armed, he decides to embark on the PGA Seniors Tour.

Thus the formation of a strange triumvirate known as Team Del, consisting of the pro, the golf club that soon becomes dubbed "Big Luther," and a caddie, Doublewide McBride. Bonnet soon learns that the caddie is long on off-the-wall intuitions, short on behavioral graces recommended by Emily Post.

While the misadventures of Team Del might not serve as a tribute to the memories Hagen and Hogan, the events detailed in The Pro stand out as perhaps the most hilarious odyssey in the modern annals of sports fiction.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

A brilliantly comic diversion, this irreverent spoof does for golf what the author's Seasons in Hell did for baseball. That is, it defines the genre in terms of spirited satire. Del Bonnet was kicked off the PGA tour for conduct involving a brown-eyed girl, oral sex and a car crash. Naturally, he also lost his job as a college coach. He has made a hard landing as the pro at Caloosahatchee Pines, a country club for geriatric golfers with "the bone structure of a parakeet" in the snake-infested swamps of central Florida. When a golf club drummer pushes a weird, big-headed "Kryptonite" driver, and Del discovers that it gives his ball super range, he decides to join the $45M Seniors Tour. Since he needs financial backing, Del's friend, groundskeeper and snake rustler Doublewide (for his house, not his size) McBride suggests Dottie Ridge, a 70-year-old former Rockette and Chiquita Banana with "the body of a rubber monkey" and control of her senile husband's sizable estate. After a strenuous "audition," Dottie agrees to back Del for a year, and they affectionately dub the club Big Luther (which is what one of Del's ex-girlfriends used to call his biggest asset in the mating game). Doublewide signs on as caddie. Shropshire outdoes himself with eccentric characters on zany outings in one remote city after another with Del and Big Luther taking on the oldest of the best with the priceless advice of Del's father, a con artist and used-car salesman. The locker room patois, much of it scatological, fits the scenario and may limit the audience, but a more hilarious look at the trappings and rituals of a country club sport would be hard to find. (June 8) Forecasts: Prominent displays and handselling could make this book as a high scorer for Father's Day.
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"It's strictly fairways and greens for Mike Shropshire in his first swing as a golf novelist. This story has more laughs than a gang of over-served hackers in The 19th Hole."-The Dallas Morning News

"A brilliantly comic diversion . . . does for golf what the author's Seasons in Hell did for baseball. That is, it defines the genre in terms of a spirited satire. . . . A more hilarious look at the trappings and rituals of a country club sport would be hard to find."-Publishers Weekly

"When author Michael Shropshire evokes comparisons with Dan Jenkins and Hunter Thompson, you can be fairly certain you're in for entertainment. This book delivers."-Fore

"The most hilarious golf novel-or sports novel-since Dan Jenkins's Dead Solid Perfect . . . [Shropshire] heads straight for the fringe, creating a collection of delightfully depraved characters who keep the narrative teetering on the brink of chaos from start to finish."
-Pioneer Press (St. Paul, Minnesota)

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Thomas Dunne Books; 1st edition (June 22, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 031224231X
• ISBN-13: 978-0312242312
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.8 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,764,853 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A New and Hillarious View of the Senior Tour, March 21, 2004

By 

John R. Linnell (New Gloucester, ME United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Pro: A Golf Novel (Hardcover)

This was my first outing with a Mike Shropshire book and while I don't think he rises to the Dan Jenkins catagory, this is a pretty funny and satirical look at the world of professional golf and more specifically the Senior Tour, or as someone dubbed it, Life's Greatest Mulligan.

Del Bonnet is a club pro at one of the dingier country clubs in this great country. He had once been to The Show. But, after an automobile accident with a woman who was busy distracting him from the perils of the road he was laughed off the PGA Tour (he was arrested during the golf tournament on national TV) and relegated to the backwaters of golf, teaching the rest of us how to stop slicing the ball and how to get out of sand traps.

However, there is a convergence of events that sets out to change his life. He turns 50 and a sales rep leaves a prototype driver for him to try out. It is labeled The Enola Gay. Bonnet gives the Enola Gay a secret workout and is astounded with the results. He confides his interest in the Senior Tour to his greenskeeper, Doublewide McBride and before you can say Dorothy Ridge, he volunteers to be Bonnet's caddie. After an experimental foray into a local Senior event, the Enola Gay performs like a champion, Bonnet supplies the rest and a plan is hatched to go to Q School and then on to the Senior Tour. Only one problem stands in his way. How to finance such a venture. That's where Dorothy Ridge comes in. A former Rockette, Dorothy was at one time the trophy wife of an captain of industry.By the time she has turned 70 the old gent is witless and foolish and Dorothy has been put in charge of his fortune. Bonnet approaches her with "an investment oppotunity", i.e. financing him for a year on the Senior Tour. During the investment discussion, a couple of bottles of wine (Pommard '61) are consumed and Bonnett discovers that Dottie still has a dancer's body and the sex drive of every guy's wet dreams. Dottie agrees to sign on if Del can survive Q School. She also comes up with a new name for the mystery driver. Big Luther. The subject arose when something else of Del's rose during the "interview."

From there the book takes off on a satrical trip through the Senior Tour. Team Del (Del, Doublewide and Luther) are on the trip of their lives, but others are plotting to derail his career and Big Luther. It's very entertaining, but better told in the reading of it than being spelled out here.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars He's No Troon McAllister!, August 14, 2004

By 

A Humble Reader - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: The Pro: A Golf Novel (Hardcover)

Pardon the pun, but the book is simply not up to par. The author tries TOO hard and the laughs fall flat, in my humble opinion. If you want solid golf fiction, shoot for The Green or The Foursome by McAllister.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Dan Jenkins has a worthy successor, August 26, 2001

By 

Roosties_Dad (Reno, Nevada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Pro: A Golf Novel (Hardcover)

This is a fantastic, one-of-a-kind, super funny, golf tome of the first order. The dialogue is superb, the plot moves without hesitation, and there are twists at every dogleg. I kept waiting for the book to drag but it only got better with each page. I wish I could think of enough superlatives to describe what a fun read this was. It's a classic that stays in my collection and will be read anytime I want a good laugh.