More than 25 million people in the United States alone play golf each year. A game born on the stark, wind-swept landscape of Scotland in the fifteenth century, golf has grown over the centuries into a global phenomenon. It is a sport not only enjoyed by professionals and the spectators of international tournaments, but one enthusiastically enjoyed by amateurs everywhere who socialize with friends and colleagues on their localcourses. Yet despite golf s widespread popularity, few of us truly know its rules, which have grown more complicated and confounding as the game has grown in...