Clubs and Tournaments Books

We use this at our weekly Scrabble Club night. It has all the official Scrabble words, including the swear words/"not for TV words"

This is most up to date, also. I love it!

Offering this book for about $50 is a ripoff! It is not available to the general public. Members of the National Scrabble Association can buy it for about $15!

As Ron Green writes: "Take away every sports event, but one. I'll Keep the Masters. I'm a hopeless fan, and I make no apologies...." Nor should he...The Masters is a one of a kind sporting event..the last sporting event that has not sold itself to altar of almighty greed. Sportsmanship, grace, beauty, and hospitality still matter at Augusta National and golf is all the better for it.

Combined with his latest book,"The Masters--101 Reasons to Love the World's Greatest Golf Tournament," this is Ron Green, Sr.'s loving and lasting tribute to the event, to the spirit he loves best, the spirit of Bobby Jones, Clifford Roberts, to golf itself, and to the spirit of Augusta.

If Journalism is history in a hurry, this book, "Shouting at Amen Corner" is good history--no, great history. It starts with Snead and Hogan, passes reverently to Palmer, Nicklaus, Player and Watson and on through to Tiger, Phil and others of the current era. Green writes about history as it happens, and, as the young lions become old lions and give way to a new generation, he writes about that, too, lovingly, caringly, but also candidly--most candidly.

This, as you might imagine, is a collection of his best coverage of the Masters beginining in 1955 and continuing through 1999. After brief introductory material for perspective, each chapter, each year, proceeds immediately into his coverage of the event....history as it happned, told by one who understands it, respects the participants, and appreciates their efforts, their agony and their ectasy.

This is a book, as he writes in the introduction, about "moments of greatness and moments of dreadful failure," all told from a deeply human perspective.

If you love golf, especially the Masters, or know someone who does, this book is a must. As was said of the ole Lone Ranger, "Return With Us Now to those Thrilling Days of Yesteryear...." That's what this book is all about, the wonderful days of yesteryear at Augusta and the men who made them wonderful.

A very nice book on a very beautiful subject for golf purists. Ausgusta National is ruled by a bunch of stiff ole grey men in green jackets. But the course and the annual tournament are stuff of legends.

The pictures are amazing! Anyone who wants pictures of Augusta this is the book.

I really like hockey, and it gave me a feeling for every goal made against them and by them; like you were actually on the ice. I had a lot of fun reading this book. The characters seemed real. Tristan, age 12.

Note from his dad: I did not read the book, but it sure held my son's attention, and this is a young person who really likes sports and DOES not like to read.

Mr. MacPherson and the editors of this book, Gary Goodman and Mark Ziegler, have turned the usually "stuffy" subject of golf on its head.

Easily one of the most humorous and refreshing stories I have read in quite some time.

Yes, the book covers Arsenal's great first double-winning season of 1970-71. Bu the most striking, most successful asoect of the book is that so much of the story comes directly from the mouths of the people involved in achieving the double. And, since it comes from a variety of mouths, then we - as readers - can feel we have received the well-rounded 'truth,' as opposed to a single author telling it from his single perspective.

The variety also makes for entertaining reading, and I found myself surprised by some of the things said. They shed light on players and areas of the 70-71 season that I hadn't known.

A good read for any football fan, I believe, and of course an absolute must-have for any true Gooner.

This is a golf jock book. Mr. Shipnuck, an experienced sports journalist, gives us his take on the Augusta National/women's membership issue that Hootie Johnson (no relation) and Martha Burk stirred up in connection with the 2003 Masters golf tournament. The author's breezy, colorful writing style lends itself well to an event that ultimately became more of a media circus, at least short-term, than anything socially significant. As a golfer and golf fan I'd followed the goings on with some interest at the time, but still learned a lot I hadn't known before, such as the Haywood J. (a name conspicuously omitted from the book's index) episode, the role played by N.Y. Times, and the one man Klan, among others. I also learned that Augusta National Golf Club is organized as a for-profit Georgia business corporation (Augusta National, Incorporated). That does not by itself invalidate Augusta National's "private club" argument, but does shed another light on the situation. I'd be interested to know how more about the club's organization, governance and finances, but there's no chance of that.

Great Book....relives and recounts one of the most intriguing political, cutural and sports controversies of our day....a very human accounting of Martha, Hootie and all those poor, somewhat innocent souls, caught up in their battle, a battle of The Hallowed Ways vs. the New Age. Fascinating book, especially the parts about the New York Times' (Howell Raines') agenda journalism and how the National as it is called took on Raines and the Times and "won." Has all the PR overtones of a Presidential campaign, only in the world of sport. Good book, even if the reader isn't a particulary big golf fan. Even a political junkie would enjoy this one...Give Mr. Shipnuck a birdie on this effort.

Alan Shipnuck has made himself into one of golf's snarkier voices with his classic shaggy-dog-story "Bud Sweat & Tees" and his sometimes barbed, often candid commentary for Sports Illustrated. So what is he doing writing a sober account of one of golf's loudest social controversies? Is he trying to be John Feinstein all of a sudden?

Actually, the motivation is purer. Shipnuck offers a detached, analytical view of what exactly happened when the Augusta National Golf Club, site of the Masters, refused demands that it admit women members.

"Hootie Johnson has four daughters," one woman tells a reporter. "How does he sleep at night?"

While some bashed Hootie, Augusta's chairman and the voice of the gender ban, others excoriated Martha Burk, the activist whose cry for membership equality seemed at times a personal crusade. Ultimately, it came down to how people felt about things like abortion, equal pay in the office, glass ceilings, female circumcision, anything but golf.

That's about my only problem with Shipnuck's book. I want him writing about golf, not peripheral culture issues like this. He overblows the importance of this particular story. But Shipnuck does a great job putting both sides of the argument in a fair light, and detailing in a clinical scorekeeper fashion just how the controversy was resolved.

Shipnuck's interest is not ideology but people. He manages to get under the placards and in the face of just about everyone who took a stand on this issue, including, in exclusive interviews, the two main players. Hootie comes across as a prickly but likable character, neither as exclusionary nor as unthinking as his critics often claimed. Martha is a cagey, doughty crusader with periods of understandable exhaustion and a fine sense of humor. When someone brings her an anti-Martha T-shirt ["If Martha had balls...She could join the club"] she gets a real kick from reading it.

She needed that sense of humor, as her strong charge, seemingly on the verge of making a miracle and bringing women members to Augusta, caused instead another miracle, that of making Americans feel sorry for a coterie of rich white men. Overplaying her hand, claiming common cause with U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq, and equating the Augusta National with the Ku Klux Klan all killed the momentum of her campaign, along with the savvy PR work of Augusta?s media consultant, Jim McCarthy.

Also damaging was the fickleness of the press, rallying behind her and then against her. Shipnuck's best work, an easy five-star essay on its own, details the various shifts in press coverage of the campaign, particularly at the New York Times, which tried to adopt Burk's campaign as their own only to have it instead contribute to the unhorsing of its own executive editor. Shipnuck's pen is sharp, whether the subject is TV commentators like Rich Eisen ["a one-time standup comic masquerading as a journalist." Ouch!], rabid bloggers, and even SI colleague Rick Reilly, who gets into a silly macho face-off with a one-man Imperial Wizard whose only white accoutrements are his prize poodles.

In the end, Shipnuck makes clear his belief that Augusta should admit women, that Johnson's refusal has denigrated the sport and forever equated him with the ardent segregationists who supported Jim Crow laws in the 1950s, but that the feminists lost their heads too quickly to make a clear case. The nice thing about "The Battle For Augusta National" is you don't have to share that view to enjoy the book. Shipnuck writes with clarity, humor, and a sense of fairness that really does credit to his profession. That puts him in the minority in the Augusta controversy.

The day after I finished this fine book I read in the newspaper that Martha Burk had won her 1st Amendment court case against the city of Augusta. The author had all but predicted this would happen, part of an insightful final chapter that basically carried the message,"This ain't over yet, folks." There is a tremendous amount of insight in "The Battle for Augusta National", and that's just one example among many. Most books in the Sports section are mindless hagiographies, but Shipnuck has written a book full of ideas - about the media, the meaning of private clubs, the culture of big business, the cronyism of Southern politics. There are plenty of other amusing digressions along the way. I will continue to scan the newspaper, awaiting new developments that I have already been told to expect.

I live in Augusta, rent my house out during Masters Week, but don't play golf or belong to Augusta National. This book is well-written and fascinating, with a few flaws. The author tries to cover a lot of stories in one book: the sport of golf generally, Augusta National, the Masters, Hootie Johnson, Martha Burk, press coverage of the controversy (including the subsequent implosion of the New York Times), and the community of Augusta. The first six are well done (except he gives Martha Burk a pass -- she has some amazingly radical ideas and positions he did not cover) and is far too kind to her. (She vanished completely at the 2004 Masters, which he does not mention). The last topic fails miserably. The author does not understand the South or Southern hospitality. He is shocked that we have an old Confederate monument on Broad Street downtown. Well, show me a town in the South that doesn't! No one here, black or white, gets very excited about it and hasn't for decades. He does not understand (or make an effort to understand) the connections a Federal judge would legitimately have with the local community in a small town. He neglects the local angle to the story and distorts what he does not neglect. The book is full of careless editorial errors -- in one sentence he refers to Fort Dixon in New Jersey (which is actually Fort Dix) and Fort Devin Massachusets (Fort Devens), errors he could have corrected with minimal care, then jumps all over other writers for confusing Augusta National and Augusta Country Club. This kind of thing makes one wonder about the accuracy of the rest of the book, in the areas which I am not so familiar with. Overall a good read, and reasonably balanced.

I didn't know much about golf before reading this book and I'm not sure I do now but it was a really funny read. This is hysterical in a good way. I liked this tremendously.

Even die-hard worshipers at the shrine of Augusta National will never watch the Master's the same way again once they've read Toonamint of Champions, a hilarious send-up of the hallowed event written by Georgia golf writer Todd Sentell.

Sentell puts a cast of outrageous characters both inside and outside the sacred grounds where golf's elite meet each spring to celebrate the game. Playing a round at Augusta is every golfer's fondest dream--and one that will never, ever come true for 99.99999% of us. But Sentell's Waymon Poodle, a daydreamer from Mullet Luv, Georgia, manages the feat in a way that defies description in a family book review.

Toonamint of Champions is the perfect read for Master's weekend. I suggest you don't try to multi-task and read it while you're waiting for Zach Johnson to line up his putts on TV, though. You just might end up laughing so hard you'll miss the winning stroke.

The Augusta National golf club deserves a pie in the face, a big foamy white sloppy cream pie.

I have never swung a golf club in my life, and at my age, not likely ever to do so. However, I am an avid watcher of golf and enjoy the Master's Tournament at Augusta National Golf Club for the high level of play of the entrants. However, for me at least, the members of the organization itself equally fascinate me.

Based on the snobbery scale, only those at level seven and above need apply. Hootie Johnson, from his Augusta National throne, issued edicts to the rest of the world. Fortunately, they apply only to Augusta National or we would by now be fighting world war three with nine irons and pitching wedges.

The members must be of the hoity-toity, the elite, or royalty and must be male (I chose "male" instead of "men" because there may be doubt about orientations). Hootie Johnson, then Augusta National Emperor descended the throne to say that Augusta National will not have commercials interrupting the Masters Tournament. Magnanimously, it would please the viewers - the little people - he implied as the reason rather than the organizations sexist attitudes.

With Toonamint of Champions, Todd Sentell has delivered the pie in the face that Augusta National has so long deserved. It is an out of the box comedic romp through all of the mores so treasured by the snobby club. Even the names of the unforgettable characters Sentell conjures up for this novel thumbs a nose at them, Waymon Poodle, Mullet Georgia, LaJuanita Mumps and the clincher, Emiglio Rafsoolicicki.

Don't try to read this book to drop off to sleep with. Chances are you'll stay awake until you've finished it and even then the comedic images Sentell has created will float across your mind and you'll wake up laughing again.

Five stars for Toonamint of Champions, six if there is such a level.

Red Evans author On IceOn Ice

Sentell's book is charming and witty and not just for those who follow golf. Treat yourself to a humorous respite from all the bad news on TV and curl up with TOONAMINT OF CHAMPIONS. You'll find yourself laughing out loud at the absurdity.

I always wondered what went on within the bastion of the golfing world...and now I know! Apparently it's full of some of the most outrageous and truly original characters, all brought to life by Todd in a blaze of comic color. The humor is terrific fun, slapstick and side splitting and whether you have feelings for the institution of golf or not, you will love what Todd has bravely done to it!

I have most every book every written about Bob Jones, Augusta, The Masters including several by Mr. Price. I believe the author was trying to show the flowing and the "behind the brain scenes" of events. It rambles. There is no doubt that Mr. Price loved, respected, admired Bob Jones--remember he really played tournament golf from 1924-1930 and won 13 majors including The Grand Slam in 1930 AS AN AMATEUR where any sort of payment clubs, balls, transportation, clothes, etc. was strickly against the USGA rules for Amateur Golfers so in 1930 when he retired, he was flat broke: with a degree in Engineering from Georgia Tech, Literature Degree from Harvard and a Law degree from Emory (but never finished because he passed the bar 2 years before graduating.
I did especially enjoy his last chapter: tender, sad, filled with loss and yet, to quote Bob's caddie on his last round of golf at St Andrews in 1936, when nobody knew he was coming yet the town shutdown when they knew "our Bobby"is back; the caddie said the only time they spoke to each other: You are a wonder Sir; Aye a true wonder! And so he was. The book is good to have but not the best and I would expect more from Price.

This book is a gem, the best ever written on Bobby, Roberts, and Augusta National. Price's account of Bobby is "priceless", if you've ever wanted to know about this amazing man and the origins of Augusta National/the Masters, buy this book.

A tremendous story about arguably the greatest golfer of all time, the most meticulously groomed golf course of all time and the best run golf tournament of all time.
The author has a thorough and scholarly approach to his writing. What makes it great though is the fact that the nearly mythical Bob Jones befriended this young writer so the book is filled with many first hand views. If you love golf and you want to know more about the origins of the modern game this is the book for you.

Tim is the best golf reviewer in the WORLD! This is seriously a MUST READ book! I promise that you will love anything that Tim writes!

Tim does a great job in reporting this account, although maybe he takes too much out on Captain's choices. Golfers understand momentum and what kind of game you have on a particular day. To say that this exciting account which particularly focuses on the singles matches and those final nervewracking shots is "mundane" does not resound to a golfer reading this book.

I have just recently finished the book Heartbreak Hill and I found it to be entertaining but also interesting at the same time. I must disagree with the Kirkus Review. This book clearly states all the information that you need in a clear form. There is not confusion. I find the analogies in this book good due to the fact that it adds some unexpected humor to this book. Although I am a golfer, I did not clearly understand the Rider Cup until I read this book. It explained a brief history of the golfers and how they fared that year. It also explains how this is the single most important golf tournament of the year and also gives a brief history on that. Whether you are a huge golfing fan or a person who just wants to read an entertaining book, I recommend that you read Heartbreak Hill.