The Franchise Babe: A Novel | 
 enlarge | Author: Dan Jenkins
Publisher: Doubleday
Category: Book
List Price: $24.95
Buy New: $12.25
You Save: $12.70 (51%)
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Avg. Customer Rating:  6 reviews
Sales Rank: 9136
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 240
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.9
Dimensions (in): 9.2 x 6 x 0.9
ISBN: 0385519109
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN: 9780385519106
ASIN: 0385519109
Publication Date: June 3, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
The legendary Dan Jenkins returns with another bawdy, over-the-top novel of hijinks on the links – this time, the LPGA gets the treatment
Jack Brannon, a golf writer in his forties who has been bunkered more than once in the marriage game, covers the sport for the big-time magazine SM. Lately he’s been bored out of his mind writing about the PGA Tour, which he says has become “Tiger and a bunch of slugs playing pushover courses.” So he decides to check out what he calls “the Lolitas,” a new breed of young chicks on the LPGA Tour. Jack chooses as a magazine subject Ginger Clayton, a fiery eighteen-year old with flowing blond locks, legs up to here, and a personality that combines mischief with confidence. With her killer looks and killer game, Ginger looks very much like the kind of star who can take the LPGA to the next level of excitement and acceptance. She is, indeed, The Franchise Babe, and everyone seems to want a part of her.
Jack’s interest in Ginger’s career might have something to do with her mother, Thurlene Clayton, a knockout herself who looks plenty okay in a jacked-up mini-to use Jack’s description of her outfit. As Ginger shows her grit on the ladies’ tour, the greedy hordes looking to benefit from the kid’s talent and personality aren’t the ones who worry Thurlene-and Jack-the most. Someone is trying to knock Ginger out of the competition-permanently.
Jenkins captures the growing buzz around the Franchise Babe and all the insane and hilarious things that happen when the sports world anoints someone new to the throne of super-stardom. Along the way, Jenkins issues bawdy, dead-on takedowns of selfish sports moms, gasbag corporate sponsors, adventurous promoters, sleazy sports agents, point-missing magazine editors, and all the other modern annoyances that make life hard for a guy who, as they say in Texas, is just tryin' to get by without gettin' hurt.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 1 more reviews...
 THE FRANCHISE BABE- DAN JENKINS REVIEW July 20, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
The Franchise Babe: A Novel
I feel most qualified to be reviewing the latest novel by Dan Jenkins: the Franchise Babe. I became hooked on Mr. Jenkins pants-wettingly funny prose back in 1980 when my Daddy passed on his copy of BAJA OKLAHOMA to me. Since then, I have read every new piece of fiction Jenkins has produced, as well as most of his older novels.
Let me start by saying that Baja Oklahoma is the funniest book EVER WRITTEN- bar none, by Jenkins or anyone. That said, The Franchise Babe is a C+ work of fiction. I give it a B- for funniness.
We have met characters like these before in Jenkins fiction.. This tome is pretty much identical in form to other novels in which an over the hill pro athlete and or writer, thrice divorced, finds true love and happiness with a give slack dirty leg in 217 pages. (If you don't know what a give slack dirty leg is, you don't know your Jenkins-isms).
If a really funny golf novel, served up with some golf history, is what you are looking for, skip this and instead read Dan Jenkins THE MONEY- WHIPPED STEER-JOB THREE-JACK GIVE UP ARTIST.
If you are looking for Jenkins' best work ever, read BAJA OKLAHOMA.
 lost a little off the fastball July 5, 2008
Dan Jenkins is the funniest writer I've ever read, as well as being an insightful commentator on the foibles of our sports obsessed culture. He continually draws characters that we either know or know about if we are fans. Almost every Jenkins book contains at least one passage where I have to stop because I'm laughing so hard I'm crying and my side is splitting open and, oh by the way I have to read it out loud to someone in earshot. This has gotten me into trouble on occasion because Jenkins will never be accused of being politically correct.
Which leads us to The Franchise Babe. It is a pleasant read, the jokes are funny but not side splittng. Its thee story of a golf writer who has had his fill of Tiger destroing the mediocrities. He decides to cover the ladiestour, in particular the lovely Ginger Clayton. Of course he hooks up with mom. The social commentary is still dead on. This is an enjoyable read, and written by anyone else would be considered really good work. However in comparison to Jenkins best work this one doesn't hold up.
I'd still recommend buying it because its better than most of the drivel being printed
good, but not his best June 30, 2008
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
Dan Jenkins has written some wonderful novels--you can often judge these but what sticks in your mind, what you remember a year or two later. I've read books where a week later very little had stuck in my mind: books are like people in that respect. Some people you forget immediately, others, even though you may have only met them once, remain in your thoughts for decades. Jenkins' Limo, for example, is now a complete blank--I read it, but all memory of it is gone. Semi-Tough and Dead Solid Perfect are at the opposite end of the scale. Franchise Babe is enjoyable, but I have the feeling that I will not remember much. Some of Jenkins' work has gotten, well, rather formulaic. Divorced sports figure or sports writer, attractive divorcee around 35, greedy agents, clueless editors, advertising people, political polemics, etc., are all present here--nothing that breaks new ground.
Jenkins pokes his usual jibes at editors, agents, sports figures, liberals, et al. Ginger Clayton (the golfer), Thurlene Clayton (Ginger's mother), and Jack Brannon (sports writer) are the "good" people here, along with brief cameos by a good ol' Texas boy and one or two others. Jenkins comments (rather unpleasantly) on the Asian golfers. You get the impression that Jenkins doesn't care much for the Asian golfers on the Tour. He has fun with names, which he has also done in many previous novels: Days Inn Lewis and Novocain Washington will remind you of football players with names such as Lemonjello and the like from other books. Some of the action occurs in Ruidoso, and we have Sinking Canoe, Smokes Loco Weed, Limping Turkey, and Smells a Possum: Jenkins makes it clear that these are Apaches (I'm not sure why an Apache from the desert country of New Mexico might be named Sinking Canoe, but never mind). You can perhaps make a stab at the intended ethnicity of Novocain Washington. You can also guess at the ethnicity of Tyler Hughes, Trey Bishop, and Debbie Wendell. Jenkins' names detract from the book--it's unnecessary and it leaves you feeling a bit dirty.
I have the feeling that Jenkins had more fun writing his earlier (say pre-2000) novels. Franchise Babe is humorous, but there's a whiff of a darker side. I'm reminded a bit of Skip Wiley, the columnist in Hiaasen's great Tourist Season. Semi-Tough and Dead Solid Perfect were more lighthearted and carefree: Franchise Babe, like those two novels, is funny, but it's not as enjoyably funny, if those two words can fit together.
Vintage Jenkins - Just Not Enough Of Ot! June 25, 2008
Long-time Dan Jenkins readers will recognize a lot of punch lines when they read "The Franchise Babe", but not a single one that isn't still funny a second, third, or fourth time around. Jenkins' irreverent, non-PC take on the world of golf, as previously visited in "Dead Solid Perfect", "The Money-Whipped, Steer-Job, Three-Jack, Give-Up Artis" and "Slim and None", is still laugh out loud funny.
I liked the continuity with his earlier novels, casting his new sportswriter character Jack Brannon - still a Texan, still from Fort Worth, of course - as a protege of his character sportswriter Jim Tom Pinch (who crossed over between Dan's football novels and his golf novels, with one foray into his own book, "You Gotta Play Hurt"). The LPGA Tour in this novel is inhabited by "Lolitas" who knock the ball a country mile and have gams that stop traffic, Mommy-Dearest golf moms, and a drop-dead gorgeous Lolita Mom as a love interest for the lucky Jack (Dan's characters ALWAYS score well in the babe department!). Knowing that Mr Jenkins is no spring chicken, I'm grateful for every sentence that comes oof of his geezer-codger typewriter, but I wish that he could have graced us with more than 224 pages in his latest effort.
 One of a Kind June 12, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Dan Jenkins is a one of a kind sports writer and a one of a kind novelist. The Franchise Babe introduces Jack Brannon, an acolyte of Jenkins' Jim Tom Pinch, who is following Ginger Clayton, a golfing Lolita, and Ginger's mother, Thurlene. The journey is pure Jenkins, with heavy dollops of sports wisdom, politically incorrect humor and a nimble narrative that moves to a satisfying if somewhat predictable conclusion. No one writes with Jenkins' wry tone and unique perspective. Think of him as the sage of Ft. Worth, with long stops in Manhattan and Florida. Each of his books is a joy ride and The Franchise Babe is no exception. He never disappoints.
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