SNAP HOOK

A dyslexic journeyman PGA golfer and sometime sleuth struggles to read greens and clues better than pages in this modest sequel to Cut Shot (not reviewed).

Jack Austin’s golf has never made headlines, but he’s off his game these days, and no wonder. A touring series of clinics in Russia organized by PGA Tour Charities director Brian Taylor threatens to founder when Taylor’s infant daughter Catherine is kidnapped. Jack’s romance with CBS analyst Lisa Trembley, “golf’s most serious journalist,” is on the skids as well, as the partners back away from marriage and wonder where they’re headed. And Jack’s breaking in a new caddy, ghetto survivor Nash Henley, whose inexperience costs Jack valuable strokes in a crucial event. Most disastrously, Jack’s erratic putting, always the weakest part of his game, threatens his place on the top 125 PGA golfers that insulates him from barnstorming the country in lower-paying events. Corrigan commands a wealth of technical detail to make Jack’s every round vivid and exciting. Alternating chapters tell you more than you ever wanted to know about a complex money-laundering scheme a bunch of pale criminals have hatched in the shadow of the Russian tour, a murder-ridden plot infinitely less suspenseful than the drama of Jack’s putting.

A muffled, forgettable mystery highly recommended for golfers, golf widows and widowers, and everybody who’s ever wondered what the fuss is about.