A Course Called Ireland

In his thirties, married, and staring down impending fatherhood, Tom Coyne was well familiar with the last refuge of the adult male: the golfing trip. Intent on designing a golf trip to end all others, Coyne looked to Ireland, the place where his father had taught him to love the game years before. As he studied a map of the island and plotted his itinerary, it dawned on Coyne that Ireland was ringed with golf holes. The country began to look like one giant round of golf, so Coyne packed his clubs and set off to play all of it. And since Irish golfers didn't take golf carts, neither would he. He would walk the entire way. "A Course Called Ireland" is the story of a walking-averse golfer who treks his way around an entire country, spending sixteen weeks playing every seaside hole in Ireland and often battling through all four seasons in one Irish afternoon. Coyne plays everything from the top-ranked links in the world to nine-hole courses crowded with livestock. Along the way, he searches out his family's roots, discovers that a once-poor country has been transformed by an economic boom, and finds that the only thing tougher to escape than Irish sand traps are Irish pubs. By turns hilarious and poetic, "A Course Called Ireland" is a magnificent tour of a vibrant land and a paean to the world's greatest game.

ISBN 1592404243   Pages 320 ISBN13 9781592404247 (What's this?)   Volumes 1 Publisher Gotham Books   Weight (grammes) 530 Imprint Gotham Books   Published in New York Format Hardback   Height (mm) 231 Publication date 04 Feb 2010   Width (mm) 162 Library of Congress 2008042769   Spine width (mm) 28 DEWEY 796.35209417   Academic level General DEWEY edition DC22

?In this cheerily self-deprecating work, Coyne?an Irish-American Philadelphian who never knew much about his roots and avoided exercise?describes how he undertook a wildly ambitious plan to spend four months playing over 40 golf courses in Ireland and getting to them by walking. Coyne's tiredness quickly translates into hiker's euphoria; however, he has a tougher time facing the Irish breakfast every B&B owner serves him (sausages, rashers, beans, soda bread an afternoon of wincing regret?). Having already written a couple of books on golf (e.g., "Paper Tiger"), Coyne knows his way around a course, but more importantly, he also knows better than to bore readers with monotonous accounts of hole after hole. His style is more that of the travelogue, as he's bowled over by one astoundingly beautiful and windswept course after the next. By the time Coyne gets to Ulster, it's clear that golf is by far the least interesting thing for him, as the author packs his humorous narrative with histor

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