Vacation Book Review

[Flatsix]

I spent last week in St Lucia which is an island located in the eastern caribbean. It's currently hurricane season and guessed we'd have some down time so I stopped by the bookstore before we left and picked up some fly fishing related reading material.

The first book that I read is The Curtis Creek Manifesto by Sheridan Anderson

The book is a cartoon like self illustrated 48-page guide to fly fishing creeks. Easy to read, full of information and illustrated in cartoon style with strategies, gear tips, fish stalking methods and everything you need to get started in the sport without the filler that some of the other "how to" books contain. The basic premise is that if you can learn what it takes to fish creeks, you can fish anything. This was a fun book, a good reference and will hold a spot on my bookshelf.


The second book is a River Runs Through It by Norman Maclean

A beautifully written book set in Missoula Montana in the 1930's written mostly about a relationship between 2 brothers. The brothers are living different lives, one is a stable husband, the other is a reporter that enjoys drinking, gambling and seems to continue to put himself in harms way. The brothers have in common a love for flyfishing that was given to them by their Presbyterian minister father and spend their hours together fishing the rivers in the area.

I would guess that 90% of us have seen the movie so there are no suprises and I won't go into great detail but I do recommend reading the book. It is a short read at 100 pages, the kind of book you pick up and finish. What I came away with is the way the story was written, the subject is so personal to Maclean that you can feel the great pain left by the death of his brother. I enjoyed the book exponentially better than the movie. Macleans descriptions of the people, the surroundings and flyfishing are what makes the book and I don't think that you can put on the screen what Maclean felt for his brother.

[meb]

The Curtis Creek Manifesto was one of the first books I bought on fly fishing in the early 80's, and to this day I still call a certain kind of setup a "bomb-proof hole".

"A River Runs Through It" is a classic. A few more worth reading, "The River Why" by Duncan , "The Earth is Enough" by Middleton, and "The Old Man and the Boy" by Ruark. Those are a few that I've reread every year or two.

[Bernard]

The Curtis Creek Manifesto was one of the first books I bought on fly fishing in the early 80's......

Me too, in fact, int he early 70s (first edition!). It was a great entry point since my MAD magazine subscription had just run out. What a great form of entertainment AND enlightenment. Some of the basics are so humorously laid-out that they really stick.

B

[Flatsix]

The Curtis Creek Manifesto was one of the first books I bought on fly fishing in the early 80's......

Me too, in fact, int he early 70s (first edition!). It was a great entry point since my MAD magazine subscription had just run out. What a great form of entertainment AND enlightenment. Some of the basics are so humorously laid-out that they really stick.

B

THATS IT!

I was trying to place the style in which it was written and why I liked it so well and you nailed it!

MAD Magazine