The 500 World's Greatest Golf Holes
The 500 World's Greatest Golf Holessucceeds in hitting precisely  the two targets any book purporting to present golf's greatestanythingmust aim for: it'll have golfers both arguing with and dreaming about its  contents. Simultaneously.This is an altogether magnificent volume, big in size, big in contents, visually  rich, and thoroughly engaging. Peper's opening essay explains how he and his  editors identified the ultimate one-tenth of 1 percent of the 500,000 or so  holes on the planet, and explores the question of what exactly makes a great  golf hole. Challenge and difficulty, certainly, but also beauty, fairness,  reputation, history, and the way it begins to eat into a golfer's mind as he or  she takes it in from the tee box. It's all in the mix. Then the funreallystarts, with a comprehensive look at the best 18--the 15th at  Cypress Point (but not the more terrifying 16th), the 18th at Pebble, the 16th  at Merion, the 17th at St. Andrews, the 6th at Royal Melbourne, and the 13th at  Augusta among them--complete with lush photography and an artist's depiction of  each. The next 100 are then rolled out in somewhat less depth, with the  remainder of the 500 receiving a thumbnail sketch and photo, along with either  appreciation or curses from golfers everywhere.And then a different kind of fun starts. The last section of the volume is  devoted to lists: the most scenic holes, the most difficult, the most strategic,  most penal, best ocean, best mountain, best American, best European, best links,  best Ross, best Tillinghast, the holes that have produced historic moments. If,  as a golfer, you can't dispute or defend the choices that make up these lists,  it might be about time to hang up the clubs.--Jeff Silverman--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.