In the News

Shelf Awareness: Forbidden Game ‘insightful’ and ‘delightful’

Tom Lavoie writes: Washburn’s extensive research and his breezy, reporter’s style make this insightful book both educational and delightful. Read the entire review at Shelf Awareness.

Despite Beijing’s golf course moratorium, some big developers have continued to show a remarkable ability to manage and massage guanxi with local government officials. Without the right connections, it would never have been possible to operate on the grand scale needed to build a golf …

Listen to BBC’s Paul Henley talk to Dan Washburn below. This interview originally ran on June 21, 2014, as part of BBC World Service’s Weekend show.

Listen to Clark Boyd’s interview with Dan Washburn below: Read the full report at PRI.org.

Read the story at WNYC.

Read the writeup on Q with Jian Ghomeshi.

The $40 million Chinese golf course (that’s now underwater) It’s been 10 years since the Chinese government made building new golf courses illegal. And, over the course of those 10 years, no country has built more golf courses than China. The reason local officials are …

In 1995, Zhou Xunshu dropped out of security guard school in the province of Guizhou and made his way south to Guangdong, China’s manufacturing heartland. With almost no money in his pocket, he was following the well-worn tracks of millions of young migrant workers hoping …

I’ve got a column in the July 7, 2014, issue of Golf World magazine. It’s called “China’s Quandary: Big Country Has a Small, Complicated Interest in the Game,” and unfortunately it’s not available online. You can, however, buy a digital edition on Google Play’s Newsstand …

Jonathan Mirsky writes: There are two books here. One is about the intricacies and arcana of golf — irons, niblicks, drivers, pars, cuts, and so on. If you are a golf maven, go for it. But the other book is on a wholly different matter: …

Shelf Awareness: Forbidden Game ‘insightful’ and ‘delightful’

Read an excerpt from Dan Washburn’s The Forbidden Game in Quartz

Listen: BBC World Service talks to Dan Washburn about China’s ‘forbidden game’ — golf

Listen: PRI’s ‘The World’ on Forbidden Game and ‘ultimate underdog’ Zhou Xunshu

Listen: WNYC’s Leonard Lopate interviews Forbidden Game author Dan Washburn

Listen: Jian Ghomeshi interviews Dan Washburn about China’s Forbidden Game

Read an exclusive Forbidden Game excerpt on Shanghaiist

Financial Times review calls Forbidden Game ‘excellent,’ ‘colorful’

‘China’s Quandary,’ my column in this week’s Golf World magazine

In the UK’s Literary Review, Jonathan Mirsky calls Forbidden Game ‘vivid’ and ‘revealing’