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Review
‘The best sports books present their heroes as complex people who happen to inhabit the world of games’ Sports Illustrated
‘Kevin Cook tells the story with great tenderness and no little humour. He has done a lot of meticulous research and never puts a foot wrong. Tommy's Honour is the stand-out book on a strong short-list' (for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year) Daily Telegraph
' Cook's idiosyncratic history of the early days of professional golf is detailed, loving, and almost novelistic. He captures the incestuous, money-obesessed, sometimes small-minded world of Scottish golf, delightfully.' '…unquestionably a book rather than a product, written for love and not lolly.' The Guardian
Product Description
The definitive account of golf’s founding father and son, Old and Young Tom Morris. For the first time, the two are portrayed as men of flesh and blood – heroic but also ambitious, loving but sometimes confused and angry. Two men from one household, with ambitions that made them devoted partners as well as ardent foes.
Tommy's Honour is a compelling story of the two Tom Morrises, father and son, both supremely talented golfers but utterly different, constituting a record-breaking golfing dynasty that has never been known before or since.
Father, Old Tom Morris, grew up a stone's throw away from golf's ancestral home at St Andrews, a whisky-fuelled caddie, a wonderful 19th century character who became an Open Champion three times before running the Royal & Ancient, then sole governing body of the game. His son, Young Tom, arguably an even more prodigious talent than his father, was a golfing genius, the Tiger Woods of his era, who at 17 became the youngest player, to this day, to win the Open Championship. He then went on to win it four times in a row, an unprecedented achievement. On one occasion, father and son fought it out at the last hole of the Championship before the son finally triumphed.
But then came the pivotal day that would change their lives forever, the death of Young Tom’s wife and unborn child. The cataclysmic events of that day eventually lead to Young Tom’s tragic death, aged 24, with his father living on for another 20 years in deep remorse.
So on the one hand, you have the story of one of the most influential figures in the history of golf, a pioneer in the birth of the modern game and of Scottish and Open Championship golf. And on the other hand – you have an extraordinary father-and-son story. It’s for every son who ever competed with his father, and every father who has guided his son towards manhood, then found it hard to let go.
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Customer Reviews
The story revolves around Tom Morris in Victorian Scotland, considered to be the founding father of golf. His golfing prowess is envied by all and sporadically matched by a few, until his son, Young Tommy, takes up the sport and surpasses his father's achievements. To reveal any more would give too much away, but it is a story of tragedy told wonderfully by Kevin Cook, who recreates the age and the golfers with no shortage of skill.
This is a book that will appeal to more than just golf fans, as the centrepiece of the story - the relationship between Old Tom and Young Tommy - is both touching and tragic. Very highly recommended.
Cook's great skill is not just as a storyteller - although he tells a great story movingly and humorously, without overdoing the sentiment. This was an age of deep rooted class prejudice that prevented a genius like Old Tom from ever being truly accepted amongst the St Andrews gentlemen; something that drove his son to distraction and, sometimes, trouble.
This is an important book because Cook explains the legacy of the founding father and son. Old Tom was a wonderful player bedevilled by an unreliable putting stroke, but he was an innovative and imaginative greenkeeper and course designer whose legacy lived on through his inspiration of a young student who learnt under him - Donald Ross, who went on to build so many of the great courses in America and did so much to popularise the game.
Young Tom's was a different but no less worthy legacy. His playing achievements alone (winning the championship belt outright, becoming the first man to win the claret jug, covering the 12 holes of Prestwick in an unheard of 47 shots) secured his place in the pantheon. But it strikes this reader that his real legacy was that he virtually invented the concept of the touring professional, breaking down class barriers and blazing a trail that travels all the way to Tiger Woods.
This is the kind of book that makes me wonder if we need to put in in the sports section at all. It is ultimately a life-affirming tale that finds, in the long life of a father and the brief but stellar life of a son, deeper truths. It is a great story that immortalises great men. A fantastic book and, in the present climate, timely.
I couldn't put it down it was that good and finished it in little over 2 days.
A great piece of history well written and holds your attention
it really felt like going back in time to the time of the Morris's defeating all on the links...truly amazing
well done Kevin Cook
buy this and enjoy !
referred to as tommy throughout... Read more
He read it and called me right away to express his liking of the book, very interesting and very well... Read more
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