I was trolling from table to table at this years East Bay Anglers show when I came across a book whose title and cover hooked me on the spot:
Fish Foolishness, by Peter Nilsen, is an epic collection of more than 100 comical cartoons on the predatory Angler and acute fish. When I read:
…I burst out laughing. Laughter is truly the best medicine.
I like this book because it’s funny and fresh; but, most importantly, because it reminds me to keep fishing fun and not to take it so seriously.
I am a geek and a bibliophile. But, I have always read books in print. That is until I got a color Nook as a gift. The number of fishing books for the Nook is impressive. The price of the Nook books are also considerably lower than printed versions. Now that’s fishconomic!
Here are a few Nook fishing books that look interesting:
A friend of mine asked me recently: “Do you cook?”. I replied: “Yes. I make great toast!” I am culinary challenged. So, I ordered a copy of Cooking The Catch by Dave “Pops” Masch.
First, Cooking The Catch is not a typical cook book! The vivid and colorful images of traditional cook books are replaced with creative hand-drawn illustrations. And each chapter starts with a personal story.
Second, Cooking The Catch is a book for all seasons. Pops organized his 270+ recipes into Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter. I was pleasantly surprised by the eight Portuguese recipes. :-).
Third, if the species lives in New England waters, it may very well be in Cooking The Catch. For example, you will find tasty recipes for bluefish, cod, crab, eel, flounder, fluke, goosefish, haddock, herring, lobster, mako, monkfish, octopus, quahog, salmon, scallops, scup, sea bass, shad, shrimp, skate, smelt, squid, striped bass, sword fish, tatoug, trout, tuna, wolfish, and yellow perch.
Since New England is now dressed in snow and ice, I opened Cooking The Catch to the Winter section. The Pops’ Portuguese Paella recipe looks Yum! I am off to the fish market.
I started surfcasting by casting bait into Poseidon’s waters. When I transitioned from bait to plugs, I fished plugs every wrong way possible. I even invented a few new wrong ways to fish plugs. ;-).
Since my countless casts returned plugs without fish, I ordered The Art of Surfcasting with Lures by Zeno Hromin. The book overflows with knowldege from the surf. Personally, I learned how to select the proper rod, reel, line, and lure based on the conditions, current, depth, time of year, and the structure I am fishing. I also learned how to properly present:
After reading Zeno’s book, I started catching quality fish. Coincidence? The number of keeper striped bass on lures in my fishing journal suggests: No.
I have had the pleasure of reading many of the books written on our striped friend: Morone saxatilis. A novel addition to the striper literature is Striper Tales, a collection of fishing stories. The stories are so well written that reading them feels like they are being told by the anglers themselves. As I listened to the forty six stories, I traveled from the jetties of Jersey, to the notorious rocks of Mountank, to the Rhody rocky shore, and to Bassachussets.
Thank you Paul Haertel, Jim “Murty” Murtagh, Mark Jollife, Nick Honachefsky, Bob Misak, Joe Pallotto, Stan Dziedzic, Allen D. Riley, Geoff Turner, Edward M. Greenberg, Frank Blasko, Bill Lellis, Larry Welcome, Pete Burawa, Mike “Saltheart” White, Kadir Akturk, Thomas Oswald, Gary Soldati, Rob Cerny, Tony Machado, Al Ristori, Andre Velez, Mike DeSimone, Tony Stetzko, Dave Anderson, Alan Cordts, Ken Zwirko, Don Guimelli, and DJ Muller for capturing these stories before they vanished with the tides of time.
The tide waits for no one. Turned off YouTube. Stop texting. Unpluged Twitter. Go fishing with a friend and make your own striper tale.
Reading The Fly Rod Chronicles is a pleasure. In chapter one, Landerman casts his line. In chapter two, he sets the hook. In chapter three, he starts his retrieve. As Landerman pulls you in, he shares stories about his childhood fishing adventures, his uncensored views on fishing politics, his near death experience, his family fishing trips, SWAMBO, and George. He also captures the essence of fly flying. Fly fishing is not just about catching fish for food or modeling catalog merchandise to fashion-ignorant trout. Fly fishing is about learning, playing, mastering an art, and teaching others this art.
I must disclose that although I was released at the end of the last chapter, I am now hooked on fly fishing. I am in the market for my first fly rod!
Tempus fugit. Fly fish.
For the last two years, I have been learning about Kayak Fishing via magazine articles and posts littering the internet. When I saw the title Kayak Fishing The Ultimate Guide By Captain Scott Null and Joel McBride at a local book store, I immediately grabbed it.The first thing that I noticed as I thumbed from page to page, was the high quality paper and awesome photography; such professional photographs are a rare species in fishing literature.The book covers a wide range of topics in detail.
In summary:
The book does not cover:
The book also features a two page glossary with 71 kayak fishing terms; a great reference.
What I found unique were the five full page advertisements for kayaking fishing gear. They are well done an non-intrusive since they appear at the end of the book.
The book is a great value for novice kayak fisherman and a good value for intermediate kayak fisherman. Advance kayak fisherman may also learn a few things.
