The Swinger: A Novel

From two of todays most highly regarded sportswriters, a funny, feisty, and mischievous novel that takes readers on a high-spirited romp between the ropes and the sheets of the PGA Tourpublished with major support from Sports Illustrated.

The most famous athlete on the planet is a bit off his game.

Maybe you heard?

His name, as we all know, is Herbert X. Tree Tremont, and hes the richest and most celebrated athlete of our timea multicultural golfing icon with fifty-three Tour wins, thirteen major victories, a smoking hot wife, and two adorable kids. Trees carefully cultivated image of country club values has made him so beloved by corporate America that he is the first celebrity in history to endorse Coke and Pepsi. The world kneels at his feet.

As it turns out, so do a good many agreeable young women. When a reporter uncovers evidence that Trees sexual appetites are as prodigious as his tee shots, his public and private lives collide, producing the juiciest scandal in sports history.

In this high-spirited romp that recalls the hilarious work of Dan Jenkins and Rick Reilly, two veteran Sports Illustrated writers have some wicked fun with recent events as they take us inside Treeworld and the secret society of elite golf. Its a wild ride that whisks us between the ropes and the sheets of the PGA Tour, cracks open Trees cloistered inner circle, and propels us around the world in high style . . . from Trees top-secret compound in Florida to the wine cellar of Augusta National for an illicit tryst on Masters Sunday . . . from the deck of his $61 million yacht to the plush interior of his favorite private plane (he owns a few) . . . from the secluded beaches of Maui to an exclusive Southampton estate.

As the scandal spirals out of control and Tree is forced underground, we get to know his entourage: Andrew Finkelman, his famously brusque manager who left IGM to manage Tree alone; Turner Darlington, the bizarre and charismatic founder and CEO of Trees main sponsor, Arrow Golf; Trees wife, Belinda, a hot-blooded Italian former bikini-model who doesnt play golf but swings a mean fireplace tool; and a healthy number of the hundreds of women whose liaisons with Tree are brought to light as the plot unfolds.

Bursting with inside observations and anecdotes about pro golf and life on Tour, The Swinger is a fast, funny, and gleefully outrageous novel that illuminates the life of the modern world-class, life-by-the-tail athlete. It is also a meditation on love, sex, marriage, friendship, celebrity, and the media. It is written with a smile, not with disdain for athletes like Tree, but with empathy and affection. It ends with the hope that Trees transformation, redemption, and return to greatness may be just around the corner.