Countdown to Lockdown: A Fourth Installment of Mick Foley's Wrestling Diaries

No professional wrestler can claim literary success on par with Mick Foley. Since 1999, he has penned three memoirs (Have a Nice Day: A Tale of Blood and Sweatsocks, Foley is Good: And the Real World is Faker than Wrestling and The Hardcore Diaries) as well as three children's books and two novels.

Foley's non-wrestling books did not translate into the same sales figures as his memoirs, despite receiving a warm reception from critics.

With this new memoir - Countdown to Lockdown: A Hardcore Journal - he returns to the world of professional wrestling.

Wrestling fans will be interested in the behind the scenes peek, most notably, in Foley's falling out with WWE owner Vince McMahon. The most serious wrestling fans often relish any dirt on McMahon. There is a little something here for them to chew on.

Foley, as usual, is tactful when discussing any of the behind the scenes "dirt." The book is primarily a journal of his preparations in joining TNA wrestling, and the imminent showdown with famed wrestler Sting.

In between the wrestling bits are chapters on Foley's charity work, obsession with Tori Amos and his family. That he can make you read a chapter based on his devotion and meeting of Amos is evidence of his appealing personality over any story depth.

It seems Foley cuts some of his fellow wrestler some slack here. Fans know his books well for his unfaltering, unending jokes on other wrestlers. Somewhere, Al Snow is crying.

Previous books have shown Foley as a competent storyteller. Have a Nice Day is an awesome action-adventure bio that happens to be set in the world of professional wrestling. Sometimes the story spills off into a tangent.

There are many tangents in Countdown to Lockdown. Some tangents go on so long you begin to think he may never get back to the original point. The journaling nature of the book leaves some of that to be expected, but a merciful editor would have spared us from some of the wandering.

Pro wrestling moves very fast. Countdown to Lockdown is a fun snapshot of a few months of the wrestling business. It does not need to be anything more