The Armchair Angler
Theoptimist By David Coggins Scribner
Most anglers should be optimists. Perhaps even the grumpiest man on the dock is at his core a person full of hope. David Coggins is one of these hopeful anglers, and through global destinations, his readers realize that optimism is not restricted by geography. Each chapter of The Optimist focuses on a specific locale and a technique or environmental situation that keeps Coggins slightly off balance, always remaining hopeful. While not a neophyte in any sense of the word, Coggins isn’t too proud to reveal his disappointments with well-timed humor. One such instance takes place on a river in Canada, when Coggins finally lands an Atlantic salmon after days of tough fishing, and the guide was “very careful not to allow me the comfort of rounding up to a threepound grilse. It takes considerably more effort to say two-and-three-quarter pounds than it does to say three pounds. Yet [guide] Denys could not be clearer.” Whenever you think it’s not worth heading out on the water, Coggins will remind you that it is.
Troutwater By Josh Greenberg Melville House
Josh Greenberg’s Trout Water: A Year on the Au Sable is a book of memory. It can probably be said that all books are full of memory, but Greenberg has written a book of memory. Stitched by stories of the past, Trout Water is also a book of melancholy. Greenberg does not wish sadness on readers as they learn that the guides who taught him so much about the Au Sable River are fading from this life, or as he recounts his boys growing from infancy to childhood, or as he describes the rivers of past springs and summers that shift and change, never keeping course. The pages are saturated with these memories almost to the point that readers might see themselves on the same grass banks and silver streams that Greenberg wanders. With incredible language and a natural gift for storytelling, Greenberg has written a book that anglers should rave about, relish, and return to time and time again.
Castingcall By Chris Dorsey Wild River Press
A gold winner at the 2021 Nonfiction Book Awards, Casting Call bursts with photographs of the world’s greatest fly waters, from Brazilian marshes and rivers swimming with tiger shovelnose catfish to the bonefish flats of the Bahamas. Television producer Chris Dorsey has created a celebration of the sport and people he loves. Stunning images of brown bears napping on the bank, monster pike with lake water dripping from their toothy jaws, and Michael Keaton hugging a tarpon in “Listerine” waves demand the reader stop and study every page of this coffee table book. In addition to Keaton, snapshots of fly-fishing celebrities include Thomas Mcguane, Lefty Kreh, Tom Brokaw, Yvon Chouinard and Liam Neeson. While many books that rely heavily on images struggle to find a balance between text and photos, Casting Call lets both breathe freely. The work of photographers Dusan Smetana, R. Valentine Atkinson, Marcos Furer, John Macgillivray, Francois Botha and others captures the essence of adventure in Dorsey’s narrative.
Fishingthewildwaters By Conor Sullivan Pegasus Books
Many of the books I review for “Armchair Angler” are about fish that can fit in a typical hand net. That’s not to say we haven’t had books about huge Atlantic salmon or belly-heavy stripers, but Conor Sullivan’s Fishing the Wild Waters brings us to a new size class with stories of bluefin tuna and marlin. This is also the first book to come across my desk that mentions a fish that in Hawaii is called ulua (giant trevally), along with the moray eels and octopus Sullivan used for bait. And I was impressed with him fishing for muskies using white suckers. A retired Coast Guard officer, Sullivan separates the book into sections about his angling adventures and how-to instruction. The narrative portion comprises the majority of the pages, as the instructional writing is sequestered to appendixes for the regions the author has fished. Readers of Anglers Journal will be familiar with the roar of an engine and the heavy tackle Sullivan fishes, as well as the meals he relishes after a successful day.