Bad Lie

Golf pro Jack Austin wants to win another golf tournament. He's won one major in his ten years as a pro and wants more. But when his friend Nash learns that his father was tortured and killed, Jack has got to help. He's done his best to be a substitute father for Nash, but Nash has always maintained a fantasy that he'd reconnect, that he could rediscover the perfect father that his memory holds. As they investigate the murdered man, though, an ugly picture develops. Owen Henley was involved with drugs, and had a connection with a major drug operator in the New England area. Digging into Owen's history exposes Jack to people who don't want anyone looking at what they're doing--people who will kill anyone, including young children, to keep the scrutiny away. Jack's investigation has to share time with his golf, but it doesn't take long before his problems start to spill over on the golf course. With his concern for his young daughter, and his affection for Nash, the other players on the circuit, and his beautiful wife, Jack Austin makes a sympathetic character. Nash's fantasies tear at him because he recognizes that they simply cannot be achieved, and would not have been achieved had any reconciliation taken place. The theme of protecting children runs through the story--with Jack's happy childhood in dramatic juxtaposition to Nash's tragic upbringing. Author John R. Corrigan brings the game of professional-level golf to life. Jack is completely convincing as a golfer, caught up in a combination of workouts, ritual magic, and philosophy in his attempt to beat the talented field and win another golf championship. Corrigan does a fine job with the mystery as well, planting clues as to the killer without making it too obvious who actually done-it. Of course, by the end, Owen's murder is only one of the many problems that Jack and his friends must face. Even if you're not a golf fan, you'll enjoy BAD LIE. I'm happy to recommend this mystery.

In golf another term for a "bad lie" is "rub of the green." I am not sure of it's derivation although I am pretty sure it's an old Scottish expression meaning "you figure your way out of this on your own - you get no help." That is pretty much what is facing PGA Tour Pro Jack Austin as he undertakes to fulfill a promise to his surrogate son, Nash Henley to help him find his biological father. That doesn't sound like an undertaking that would be fraught with danger and even death, but as it turns out, it is all that and more. One of the things I like about this series is that while Jack Austin is a PGA Tour golfer, that fact does not dominate the story, but is very nicely woven into it's fabric with much factual information as well as vignettes which have a ring of authenticity to them. That Jack Austin has managed to have a career that has now lasted several years on the PGA Tour is in itself remarkable given the outside distractions he has had to endure. However, Corrigan makes it all plausable. A note on the book jacket compares the author favorably to Robert B. Parker and Dick Francis. He is a much better writer than Parker, but as I have thought about it, the allusion to Francis works for me. John Corrigan's books about Jack Austin are as much about golf as Francis's were about horse racing. They both have interesting characters, pay attention to the details of the sport that they use for a background and spin stories that keep you turning the pages. I see no point in outlining the plot. What you really need to know is that if you like a nice mystery, enjoy good writing and every so often tee it up you will most likely find this author well worth your time. Teeing it up isn't required, however. I never rode a race horse, but I read all of Francis's novels. I have read all of John Corrigan's also. I hope he has as long a run.

In "Bad Lie," John Corrigan's latest and finest book featuring pro-golfer Jack Austin, the author provides tournament-winning prose, plotting and character development. The skillfully crafted ending surprised even this voracious (three or four novels per week) consumer of fiction! Players and lovers of golf have already provided favorable reviews of Corrigan's knowledge of the game and the realties of life on the pro tours. Being neither a player nor lover of the game, I shall confine my comments to matters that I care about. What impresses me most about "Bad Lie" is Corrigan's insights into and sensitivities to the realties of life for those of his characters who deviate from the stereotypical image of golfers, attendants and fans as being predominantly white, Anglo-Saxon, heterosexual, upper or upper-middle class, dominant males. A major character in "Bad Lie" is a woman with two children and a militarily-disabled husband to care for at home on her "Wal-Mart Associate" cash-register attendant's salary. Jack Austin accepts and treats his journalist wife, Lisa, as an equal in every respect (as well he should, since she is). They have adopted an African-American son, born and raised on the hard streets of Roxbury, Massachusetts. Jack's caddy is gay and one of his best pro-golfer friends is a "fallen" Catholic priest who innocently attracts women like bees to honey. In "Bad Lie," John Corrigan indisputably proves his extraordinary talent as a writer, his love and knowledge of golf, and most of all his humanity!