The Gods of Golf

Like their Olympian cousins, the gods of golf are a high-strung, ribald lot, not the sort of deities you'd want to offend. But young Tom Cruickshank can't seem to avoid doing just that when he's transported to the celestial greens on Mount Augustus in this loopily outrageous golf fantasy from first novelists Smith and Holms. When narrator Tom makes a fool of himself while trying to impress his boss on New Jersey's famed Pine Valley links, he and a mysterious guide, Harry Brady, are transported to the Country Club of the Gods. There, Tom and Harry play golf, all the while encountering the imposing immortals who have much to say, some of it amusing, about slices, excuses, bad lies, divots and cruelty. The verbal underbrush is thick, full of fables, lessons, laws, anecdotes and unexpected twists and turns. Many golf lovers traipsing through it will find much to cheer about, but non-golfers may discover the story to be one big sand trap. Others, meanwhile, will note that the humor, though breezy, sometimes brassy, is aimed at a distinctly male readership (as in the discussion of ""Heidi, Goddess of Hookers""). But, then, so was the humor in two other recent golf novels, Rick Reilly's Missing Links and Turk Pipkin's Fast Greens (Forecasts, May 13). Those in search of more universal golf writing may want to wait for John Updike's Golf Dreams, due out from Knopf in September. (July)