The Franchise Babe

I've read them all...from Dead Solid Perfect to this one. Jenkins sometimes wavers a tad, but just between you and me, every now and then you need a Dan Jenkins novel to scrape off the crust of the politically correct climate out there and get down to the nitty gritty of life and not take things so seriously. You either like this type of writing or you don't and clearly some on here who have reviewed this novel have their knickers in a bunch and that's OK, because if some people don't react that way, Jenkins hasn't done his job. My only real complaint about this book is that it should have been longer. It is just too much fun reading the thinly veiled satire of the PGA Tour as well as the LPGA Tour management. For instance, Ginger Clayton could have had a few more problems on her way to being the "franchise babe." Jenkins still has a lot of hop on his politically incorrect fastball which is one of the reasons that I love his writing so much. Those of us who follow the tours understand where Dan is coming from. Carolyn Bivens, the current LPGA Commissioner is never mentioned by name, but she is very much the one in the book who is "off to Denmark" during the playing of an LPGA major which she has turned over to a Frenchman who has some really politically incorrect aspects of his businesses. Well done satire is an art and Jenkins confines his to what he knows best...sports. If it is your cup of tea, hop on board. Better yet...make it a Bombay Sapphire martini with four olives and get into the spirit of the thing.

One more very funny,suitably sexist,terrifically politically incorrect, bit of DeadSolidPerfection...on the LPGA tour. Cynical Sportswriter finds enlightenment via TeenGolfGoddess & her mom, with the richly portrayed wacked characters,real tour insight,golf historiography, & drop your putter one-liners we expect from Dan Jenkins. Not the outragously rich bawdy banquet of earlier works,but continuing proof that nobody can spin a hilarious,insightful,satisfying sports yarn better. BBC

When one reads a book by Dan Jenkins, one does not look for any comparison to Dostoyevsky or Cervantes - one looks for sheer entertainment and hilarity. This book didn't disappoint me - Jenkins' Jack Brannon is a solid character with a notebook full of funny lines to use in any situation and his coverage of the women's pro golf tour gives him a chance to haul them all out. Sports action, a mild love story, some protest marchers, some outrageous rich people... what more could you ask for in a Jenkins skewering? Is this book politically incorrect? Come on, it's Dan Jenkins! Might some readers be offended by it? Only if they have zero sense of humor. Simply, I laughed aloud a few times and continue to think Jenkins is a comic (and golf writing) treasure. I found it far better than some of his recent novels, but this pales in comparison to his wonderful "Baja Oklahoma" and terrific non-fiction "Dogged Victims of Inexorable Fate."

Long-time Dan Jenkins readers will recognize a lot of punch lines when they read "The Franchise Babe", but not a single one that isn't still funny a second, third, or fourth time around. Jenkins' irreverent, non-PC take on the world of golf, as previously visited in "Dead Solid Perfect", "The Money-Whipped, Steer-Job, Three-Jack, Give-Up Artist" and "Slim and None", is still laugh out loud funny. I liked the continuity with his earlier novels, casting his new sportswriter character Jack Brannon - still a Texan, still from Fort Worth, of course - as a protegé of his character sportswriter Jim Tom Pinch (who crossed over between Dan's football novels and his golf novels, with one foray into his own book, "You Gotta Play Hurt"). The LPGA Tour in this novel is inhabited by "Lolitas" who knock the ball a country mile and have gams that stop traffic, Mommy-Dearest golf moms, and a drop-dead gorgeous Lolita Mom as a love interest for the lucky Jack (Dan's characters ALWAYS score well in the babe department!). Knowing that Mr Jenkins is no spring chicken, I'm grateful for every sentence that comes of of his geezer-codger typewriter, but I wish that he could have graced us with more than 224 pages in his latest effort.

Long-time Dan Jenkins readers will recognize a lot of punch lines when they read "The Franchise Babe", but not a single one that isn't still funny a second, third, or fourth time around. Jenkins' irreverent, non-PC take on the world of golf, as previously visited in "Dead Solid Perfect", "The Money-Whipped, Steer-Job, Three-Jack, Give-Up Artist" and "Slim and None", is still laugh out loud funny. I liked the continuity with his earlier novels, casting his new sportswriter character Jack Brannon - still a Texan, still from Fort Worth, of course - as a protegé of his character sportswriter Jim Tom Pinch (who crossed over between Dan's football novels and his golf novels, with one foray into his own book, "You Gotta Play Hurt"). The LPGA Tour in this novel is inhabited by "Lolitas" who knock the ball a country mile and have gams that stop traffic, Mommy-Dearest golf moms, and a drop-dead gorgeous Lolita Mom as a love interest for the lucky Jack (Dan's characters ALWAYS score well in the babe department!). Knowing that Mr Jenkins is no spring chicken, I'm grateful for every sentence that comes off of his geezer-codger typewriter, but I wish that he could have graced us with more than 224 pages in his latest effort.