NONFICTION - Oct. 6, 1991

HARD COURTS by John Feinstein (Villard Books: $22.50; 45 pp.). Feinstein, author of “A Season on the Brink,” hits the road to observe the professional tennis tour in all of its big-business glory. And 1990 was the perfect year for such a study, since old-timers like Navratilova and McEnroe were trying to hang on, while kids like Jennifer Capriati, and some who would not be as fortunate, dreamed of breaking through. The author has a nice, irreverent feel for a scene, for the particular, peculiar madness of being a 14-year-old kid losing in the second week of a 10-week European tour, while her father negotiates with a real estate developer who wants to build a house for the family so that the development will get free publicity every time the player’s hometown is mentioned. But Feinstein’s breezy, often glib here-I-am style gets a bit tired as the book progresses. This is a sport that spews out scores of has-beens who are barely old enough to vote, that can break a teen-ager’s heart, if not his spirit, and change an entire family’s life forever. A bit more attention could have been paid to the story behind the story, but then, show business has never been about the rejects.