Gallery

Oklahoma Secretary of State Susan Savage welcomes Alan B. Hollingsworth to a podium at the state capitol to discuss his novel, University Boulevard, nominated for book of the year in the Oklahoma Reads Oklahoma contest, celebrating the Oklahoma Centennial.

L to R: A.B. Hollingsworth, author of University Boulevard, nominee for the 2005 Oklahoma Reads Oklahoma contest; Billie Letts, author of The Honk and Holler Opening Soon, the 2004 winner of the Oklahoma Reads Oklahoma contest; Susan Savage, Oklahoma Secretary of State; Anita May, Executive Director, Oklahoma Humanities Council; Susan McVey, Director, Oklahoma Department of Libraries.

In March 2001, Sleeping Bear Press took out a back-cover ad for Flatbellies in Publishers Weekly, on the hope that the book might cross over from golf to mainstream fiction. The gamble paid off, and soon, softcover rights were sold to W. W. Norton & Company (New York/London).

Another break came when Flatbellies was reviewed in USA Today, sending the book onto several bestseller lists, including #1 Amazon golf book and #7 Amazon sports book. Dr. Hollingsworth’s employer, Mercy Hospital-OKC, presented him with this display of the book cover with the USA Today review.

Named as a 2001 “Hot Book for the Summer” by Barnes and Noble, the reviewer made it clear that Flatbellies was more than a golf book.

The author signs copies of University Boulevard at the Oklahoma Reads Oklahoma awards banquet, part of the state’s Centennial Celebration.

The moment about which every writer dreams – the shipment arrives where the author sees the actual book for the first time. In his left hand, Hollingsworth holds the stack of letters from more than 40 literary agents who rejected the book. As it turned out, Flatbellies was accepted for publication by direct submission to the publisher by the author, unagented.

Many of the antics of the boys in Flatbellies were derived from a group that humbly named themselves “The Magnificent Seven.” While 5 of the 7 were on the golf team, the group met for their reunion the evening before the Flatbellies golf tournament. L to R: Mike Cole, Jim Brinkley, Fletcher Handley, Alan Hollingsworth, Andy Bass, Tim Dylina (not pictured: Steve Arthurs).

The book’s success prompted a reunion of former El Reno High School golf team members, in the form of a Flatbellies golf tournament and dinner. Of those attending, this photo (used by the El Reno Tribune) included team members who had served as the basis for characters in the book. Front to back: Fletcher Handley, Tim Dylina, Drew Hodges, Jack Hodgkinson, Andy Bass, and author Alan Hollingsworth.

Tim Dylina (“L.K.”) is still long knock king, while Fletcher Handley (“Peachy”) looks on at the Flatbellies reunion golf tournament.

While Flatbellies was written at a leisurely pace over 7 years, the sequel University Boulevard was contracted with a one year deadline. Here, the author is in Jamaica for a wedding, but still trying to meet that deadline.

In the era when typewriters were being replaced by word processing, the author opted to write in longhand. As a full-time physician, the author had to use weekends and vacations to write, here in Sandestin, Florida, circa 1995, writing Flatbellies (in pencil).

Book signing for Flatbellies at a Philadelphia Barnes & Noble, 2001

The 2001 U.S. Open was held at Southern Hills in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Southwestern Bell became an unofficial sponsor and champion of Flatbellies, providing free copies to the guests visiting their tent and inviting A.B. Hollingsworth to sign the books throughout the tournament. Oklahoma President of Southwestern Bell, Jim Epperson, also arranged for the author to serve as guest speaker for a statewide meeting of his executives, focusing on the teamwork principles in the book.

The publisher saw an opportunity to publicize Flatbellies when it was learned that the “Peachy” character (based loosely on Fletcher Handley, El Reno, OK) worked every year as a marshal at the Masters Golf Tournament. With the release of the book timed with the Masters, the Augusta Chronicle picked up on the idea and published a feature story.

In October 2001, Flatbellies was named “One of the Top Ten Golf Books of All Time” by a panel of 12 east coast sportswriters, published in the Washington Times. The accompanying article pointed out that author A. B. Hollingsworth was the only one of the 10 who was neither a professional golfer nor a professional writer. In fact, he had stopped playing golf after high school.

At the Flatbellies reunion dinner, the author and his mother look over the cake that is decorated with a likeness of the book cover.

Readers of Flatbellies are familiar with a climactic scene that takes place when the boys interpret a local psychic’s prophecy to mean that they should climb to the top of the local grain elevators. Because so many of the book’s events take place at real venues, one of the characters (Linda Bass, a.k.a. “Kelly”) served as local tour guide for book clubs that wanted to visit all the locations described in the novel.

A.B. Hollingsworth preparing for a live TV interview about Flatbellies at the 2001 U.S. Open in Tulsa at Southern Hills Country Club.

By coincidence, the release date of Flatbellies corresponded to the state golf championship being held, for the first time, in El Reno, Oklahoma, site of the fictional El Viento in the book. During the trophy presentation to the championship 5A team from Lawton MacArthur, the hosting El Reno golf coach (Ken Posey, the author’s coach more than 30 years earlier) announced that the new book would be available to all participants at no cost, courtesy of the publisher. Some of the players on the winner’s stand are holding their book copies, while author A. B. Hollingsworth has walked into the ending of his own novel.

Book review of University Boulevard, the “serious” sequel of Flatbellies. Although the ending of the first book was conclusively drawn, A. B. Hollingsworth was asked to take the characters to college amidst campus protests and the Vietnam War.

Six years after the publication of Flatbellies, then University Boulevard, author A.B. Hollingsworth continued to address book clubs about the writing process and his experiences.

Derby High School (near Wichita) Language Arts Instructor, Carolyn McCown, created a study guide for Flatbellies to use in her Honors English classes. Along with Shirley Wells and Elizabeth Miller, the three teachers used the novel for instruction in their classes for several years. At the end of each semester, author A.B. Hollingsworth would travel to Kansas to speak with the students who had studied Flatbellies over the course of the semester, answering questions about the writing process in general, and the characters from the book specifically.

After the general session with Honors English students at Derby High School, the author would meet with smaller groups and book clubs to discuss Flatbellies.