Blindfolded: An Episodic Account of America's First Golfing Genius

A century before Tiger Woods' 2009 breakdown, the best golfer in America was embroiled in an equally corrosive "secret life" However, the truth of this man's hidden shame stayed out of the press for decades after his shocking demise. Proceeding from facts known of the player in question, as well as his clan, this historical novel conjectures several major unreported melodramas that engulfed that family of immigrant Scots - beyond the trials of its central character. Their collective miseries are spellbinding; their triumphs, tragic; and their strains to cleanse the stain of sin, haunting. As for their golfing, be prepared for an amalgam of wondrous and excruciating play.

This is R.N.A. Smith's fifth golf book and first historical novel. On Social Security's brink, he still shoots in the 70s more oft than not, for which R.N.A. is humbly grateful. At the same time, it wearies him to have cared too much for so long on that score - a bit like Willie in this book. The founder of golf's one-and-only online literary magazine (DIVOT), R.N.A. is contemplating a return to Web life for his next venture in golf-writing.