Slim and None [Paperback]

Dan Jenkins (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback
• Publisher: Broadway (2005)
• ASIN: B002JLQL8I
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)

More About the Author

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

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Slim and Fun!!, January 13, 2006

By 

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

This review is from: Slim and None (Hardcover)

Figuring out how many stars to give a Dan Jenkins book requires some experience in reading this most entertaining author. I can assure you that you will most likely look a long time to find one of his efforts on the shelves at Barbara Streisand's home and Maureen Dowd probably hasn't had the pleasure either. However, from time to time there is just no substitute for a trip through the imaginitive mind of the various characters fashioned by Mr. Jenkins.

In this instance we are returning to the PGA tour with an older, somewhat wiser and thrice divorced Bobby Joe Grooves. We have been there before with Bobby Joe in "The Money - Whipped Steer - Job Three - Jack Give - Up Artist," and this novel is a decided improvement on that one.

Somehow, Bobby Joe has managed to stay on the tour for some time and now as he turns forty-four he realizes "forty-four is not a good age for a pro if he has never won a major...and I'd clean forgotten to do that in my eighteen years on the tour."

In addition to failing to bag a major, Bobby Joe has failed in his efforts to find a life partner other than his caddie, however things begin looking up in that aspect of things as he encounters Gwendolyn Pritchard, a major league "shapely adorable" and the divorced mother of a new teen age phenom on the tour, Scott Pritchard.

The story opens with these two lines, "It had to be the first bare navel on the Master's veranda. Luckily it came with a shapely adorable."

And it only gets better as we follow the twists and turns of Bobby Joe's efforts to become the winner of a major championship through the four venues where they are played that year. The story is replete with interesting and exaggerated characters and situations and you will find yourself chuckling and laughing through all 243 pages of Jenkin's latest.

Having read all of his other fiction efforts and some of his non-fiction books, I promise you that if you are a golfer, enjoy a healthy dose of non PC humor and have spent any time in Texas, there are just two chances that you will not enjoy this latest one...........

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I Loved It!! Best Effort in Years!!, August 4, 2005

By 

Mario Lawrence (Waldorf, MD United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Slim and None (Hardcover)

I must first admit that I have been a Dan Jenkins fan for the past several decades. His recent books (according to some) have waxed and waned over the past decade but "Slim and None" in my view is one of his finest efforts ever--it should be ranked with "Semi-Tough", "Limo" and "Dead Solid Perfect" as his best works. True, it is not very long, but as one reviewer noted, there are numerous passages where you will spontaneously break out in audible laughter. I found this to be a lean, concise, hysterical read and I recommend it very highly.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A quick and fun read, June 8, 2005

By 

Armchair Interviews (Minneapolis, MN) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Slim and None (Hardcover)

Dan Jenkins has twice before introduced us to Bobby Joe Grooves, PGA Tour player - each time in ways that made us identify with his quests for love, fame, and of course, golf championships. Each time Bobby Joe has gotten married, divorced, won some and lost some.

Slim and None is a novel that builds on what readers have enjoyed in Jenkins' past books. Now, however, Bobby Joe is 44. Only seven men have ever won a major championship after that age and he thinks this is his last best chance, especially since he's playing well.

But then life gets in the way. 1) Scott Pritchard, the 19-year-old phenom, whose recently divorced, drop-dead gorgeous Mom may become the fourth Mrs. Grooves, and 2) A USGA official rules against Bobby Joe in several critical tournaments, each time costing him the win he so badly wants.

Jenkins is a master of peppery down-home dialogue that introduces us to language that is to say the least, colorful- and downright funny most often. There are the "inside the ropes" names for golfers we know - like Elvis Woods, Madonna Els, and Britney Mickelson. And when a fellow competitor is paired with 17-year-old golf prodigy Tricia Hunt, who out drives him by 50 yards, we hear that she successively "Americaned" him, "Continentaled" him, "Fed-Exed" him, and "Goodyear blimped" him - all colorful ways to let us know that she flew right by him.

www.ArmchairInterviews says golfers will love all the golf history that is so seamlessly woven into the story line. And observers of human nature will find plenty to watch as this story unfolds.