Sports journalist Neil Squires was used to rubbing shoulders with athletes at the top of their game. He ghostwrote the memoir of England rugby legend Johnny Wilkinson (for our American listeners, that’s like being the personal writer of Tom Brady) and covered sport for the national papers. Yet Neil never expected to be a famous athlete himself, and certainly did not imagine becoming one in middle age… until a WhatsApp message out of the blue changed that.
Laid off from his journalism job, Neil and a group of friends traveled 5500 miles to Hokkaido, Japan, to participate in a bizarre yet strangely compelling sport: Mölkky, also known as Finnish skittles. Neil and his teammates represented Britain and became unlikely media celebrities in Japan. The result of this odyssey is the endearing and charming book The Fall and Rise of the Mölkky Bar Kids: A Sporting Underdog Story, which is out now.
Listen to Neil Squires here on the Travel Writing Podcast or find us on Spotify or iTunes.
Cover image by Kanenori from Pixabay
