Tales from Q School: Inside Golf's Fifth Major
by John Feinstein
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Book Summary Information
Author: John FeinsteinEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2008-06-05
ISBN: 031601432X
Number of pages: 368
Publisher: Back Bay Books
Book Reviews of Tales from Q School: Inside Golf's Fifth Major
Book Review: Marginal
Summary: 3 Stars
Feinstein collects the best "Q-School stories" in this entertaining, if uneven, book. Q-School is the tournament marginal golfers must excel in to make it back to the PGA Tour. The lesson Feinstein teaches is that nearly every golfer is marginal at some point (and often at many points) in his career, so all roads lead to Q-School.
Q-School stories fascinate professional golfers for obvious reasons. But they also fascinate the average reader, who can identify with the challenges one often faces to keep ones status in life and to the insecurity that defines our current economy. To paraphrase Hemingway, the best and truest stories always end in death -- in this case death of the golfer's PGA Tour hopes.
The stories are fascinating, particularly given the maddening unpredictability of golf that is aggravated by the ridiculous shortness of one tournament and by the immense pressure on the golfers. One wonders why golfers put up with this. Why is it that the monetary payout is so skewed between the privileged few who make the "major" league of any sport and the barely-paid many who languish in the "minor" leagues? The difference in talent level is often razor thin. There seems something uniquely American about such a brutal meritocracy, but Feinstein does not explore it.
The book tells Q-School stories in a meandering and disorganized fashion until the end, when the stories from one-year's tournament are collected in one telling, and an epilogue is included. More concerning than the disorganization is Feinstein's failure to do what he did so well in his earlier books, such as "The Punch", when he was able to tell the story and backgrounds of the athletes so well that the reader is left with real empathy and affection for them. This requires an incredible amount of work by the journalist, and one suspects that Feinstein's latest books are simply researched and written too fast.
The topic is too interesting, and Feinstein too good a writer, to give this book a bad review. But Feinstein's letting his standards slip.
Summary of Tales from Q School: Inside Golf's Fifth Major
It is the tournament that separates champions from mortals. It is the starting point for the careers of future legends and can be the final stop on the down escalator for fading stars. The annual PGA Tour Qualifying Tournament is one of the most grueling competitions in any sport. Every fall, veterans and talented hopefuls sweat through six rounds of hell at Q school, as the tournament is universally known, to get a shot at the PGA Tour, vying for the 30 slots available. The grim reality: if you don't make it through Q school, you're not on the PGA tour. You're out. And those who make it to the six day finals are the lucky ones: Hundreds more players fail to get through the equally grueling first two stages of the event. John Feinstein tells the story of the players who compete for these coveted positions in the 2005 Q school as only he can. With arresting accounts from the players, established winners, rising stars, the defeated and the endlessly hopeful, America's favorite sportswriter unearths the inside story behind the PGA Tour's brutal all-or-nothing competition.General Books
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