Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #42450 in Books
• Published on: 2007-02-01
• Binding: Hardcover
• 320 pages

Judges, BOLLINGER EVERYMAN WODEHOUSE PRIZE FOR COMIC FICT.
"A wonderfully engaging and extraordinary tale of love, fly-fishing and political spin. Torday treated the judges to a novel that was poignant and hugely entertaining in equal measures."

Review
'It's hilarious and so well observed' (Sir Christopher Meyer )

'A most diverting debut - ingenious, witty and moving, Yes Minister meets Monarch of the Glen.' (David Profumo )

'A wonderful book - a cry for humanity in our target-driven spin-riddled world.' Marina Lewycka (Marina Lewycka author of A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian )

'I really loved this book.' (Bill Nighy )

'It is light, but succeeds in an ambitious project: making a book about fishing readable, even touching. Fish may not be your bag, but it is the capacity for commitment and belief that makes for good reading.' (Nadia Saint NEW STATESMAN (22.1.07) )

'[a] wickedly comic first novel about the power of money and the miracle of faith.' (SAGA (February) )

'This is a wonderful, enjoyable read...Written in a highly accessible pastiche of memos, letters, interview excerpts, journal entries and emails, Fishing, encompasses everything from the science of salmon spawning to the war in Iraq. But all these elements merely give structure to the story: a lovely musing on how risking it all - however much it may be perceived as foolish or ridiculous, can bring hope and faith and love to the most bleak of outlooks...' (Daneet Steffens SCOTLAND ON SUNDAY (28.1.07) )

'[Salmon Fishing...] captivates the grumpiest reader within moments...if you imagine The Office crossed with Yes, Minister, you may get some inkling of how very funny it is...the intelligence, inventiveness and humanity of this novel in comparison to the usual run of literary fiction is as wild salmon to the farmed.' (Amanda Craig TELEGRAPH (27.1.07) )

'Salmon Fishing in the Yemen has elements that were once familiar in numerous comic novels: a hapless innocent caught up in political machinations; an exotic setting; an upper-class girl for the romantic interest. But the political machinations here have a contemporary flavour.' (Nicholas Clee TLS (2.2.07) )

'Entertaining storytelling with great characters and laugh-out-loud plot.' (Fanny Blake WOMAN & HOME (March 2007) )

'Paul Torday's bizarrely moral debut offers whimsy, sitcom humour, numerous swipes at the two-faced carry on of egocentric politicians - including a joke, Blair-like prime minister - and more than a love song to the noble art of angling as practised by dreamers and romantics. it also suggests that anything can be attempted, providing someone is willing to pay.' (Eileen Battersby IRISH TIMES (3.2.07) )

'Salmon Fishing in the Yemen is an entertaining and successful debut... it is warmly recommended to anyone searching for feelgood comedy with surprising bite.' (Matt Thorne SUNDAY TELEGRAPH (4.2.07) )

'[a] charming narrative.' (Alexandra Heminsley THELONDONPAPER ( 6.2.07) )

'[a] clever, original and funny novel...A magical debut.' (PSYCHOLOGIES (March 2007) ***** )

"At last an Evelyn Waugh for the 21st century. Paul Torday is funny, humane, poignant and one of the most original writers in the UK today. Salmon Fishing in the Yemen reinvigorated my already abiding love of contemporary fiction and I am gratfeul to Mr Torday for it. I urge each and every one of you to buy this book and then sit on the nearest seat to the till and read it, really" Paul Blezard - Oneword Radio. (Paul Blezard )

'[a] wonderful first novel...really funny...a book you can't put down easily. Torday has an easy command of the gripping twists that play readers through the streams of a story, and at the same time he's a master of character...a tour de force.' (Lucille Redmond EVENING HERALD (Dublin, 27.1.07) )

'This highly original novel blends satire with gentle humanity in a tale of what happens when idealism meets self-serving politics and bungling bureaucracy...A stunning debut.' (Clare Colvin DAILY MAIL (9.2.07) )

'This is a book of considerable charm, an echo-chamber of a dozen different voices adroitly ventriloquised...[it's] a moral tale about the importance of believing in something and the comparative importance of everything else.' (John Walsh INDEPENDENT (9.2.07) )

' [a] delightfully funny debut...It's funny, ambitious, multi-layered and quirkily imaginative, yet still - especially in the case of a sub-plot featuring a deniable British raid inside Iran - frighteningly relevant.' (David Robinson THE SCOTSMAN (10.2.07) )

'[a] remarkable, unusual debut novel about political spin and unlikely dreams brought vividly to life... [Torday has] a rare talent.' (Rodge Glass HERALD (10.2.07) )

'[a] tender hearted book...[and a] thoroughly enjoyable debut.' (Lucy Atkins SUNDAY TIMES (18.2.07) )

'suffused with warmth; with magic and a fond quirkiness...This is a clever book encompassing sport, political spin and scientific experimentation. Torday's ease with language is masterful; and he has a beautifully judged sense of place...There's a clever sense of denouement, but ultimately it's the characters that make this page-turning tale shine.' (Sue Leonard IRISH EXAMINER (Cork, 10.2.07) )

'[this] gentle novel explores the meaning of faith in the modern world...[it] is most enjoyable when the focus is on the riverbanks of Scotland and the Yemen. Torday describes the routines of fly-fishing - of gillies and smolts, riffles and glides - to great effect.' (AM Kaye TIME OUT (21-27 February) )

'Paul Torday's debut novel is about an impossibility...And the remarkable thing is that a book about so deeply serious a matter can make you laugh, all the way to a last twist that's as sudden and shocking as a barbed hook...As with all good comedy, there's a tragic underside...And there is satire...To write a novel lampooning the looking-glass world of Blairite government must have given Torday as much gruesome fun as he gives his readers...Salmon Fishing is extraordinary indeed, anda triumph.' (Tim Mackintosh-Smith GUARDIAN (24.2.07) )

'[Salmon Fishing... is] really something exceptional. I know it's only February, but this has to be one of the books of 2007. It has everything I can ask for in a book and one of the most surprising endings that I have ever read.' (WWW.THEBOOKBAG.CO.UK )

'an amusing satire on the tensions between the West and the Middle East, and a commentary on the value of belief to mankind...The success of the book lies in the charm of Mr Torday's storyline - his love of salmon fishing shines through his text - and his skill at portraying the petty officialdom and manipulativeness of modern government. Adding breadth is a sharply drawn cast of characters...' (THE ECONOMIST (3.3.07) )

'A hilarious and pithy expose of political hypocrisy and bureaucratic wheeler-dealing, the novel also explores the deeper questions of human existence as Alfred, a fish out of water himself, finds his life and perspective irrevocably altered by his experiences.' (GOOD BOOK GUIDE (March 2007) )

"A wonderfully engaging and extraordinary tale of love, fly-fishing and political spin. Torday treated the judges to a novel that was poignant and hugely entertaining in equal measures." (Judges BOLLINGER EVERYMAN WODEHOUSE PRIZE FOR COMIC FICT. )

SAGA (February)
'[a] wickedly comic first novel about the power of money and the miracle of faith.'

Customer Reviews

What a pleasant surprise!
I'd seen this book in the shops and hadn't taken too much notice of it as the title rather put me off. I'm not particularly interested in fishing (well - not at all, really) and the Yemen sounded rather distant and obscure. However, a friend recommended it to me and lent me his copy. I put it on my pile of "books to read" (which is rapidly approaching the ceiling) where it remained for a while. I'd finished reading my last book and grabbed this one off the pile before rushing off to work one morning and how glad I am that I did! I thoroughly enjoyed it. It's witty, unusual, interesting, informative and has a clever and unexpected ending. I found the style of writing interesting, being a mixture of emails, reports, narrative, and correspondence, despite which it was not in the least bit confusing. Also, the rather terse (on one side, at least) correspondence between our hero (if that's what we can call him) and his wife brought a smile to my face as it possibly reflected some married couples' relationships all too well! I now know quite a bit about salmon, their habitat and their breeding habits that I didn't before reading this, which information was imparted totally painlessly and didn't detract from the plot. I'm so pleased that my friend persuaded me to read this book and I shall certainly recommend it to others. It was very different from anything I've read before. Do give it go!

Delightful Yarn
A satirical, humorous fishy tale, flavoured with the double-speak of the British civil service, politicans, an empty marriage, the different faces of love, faith, hope, and incompetent Yemini Jihadis. Much to his dismay, Fisheries Scientist Dr. Alfred Jones is ordered to do the impossible, which is to populate the Wadi Aleyne in the highlands of the Yemen with wild salmon. His wife Mary, a successfull international banker, with a mind like a Microsoft Excell spread sheet, is certain the project will fail. Fred also thinks it's a hair brained scheme, until meeting Ms Harriet Chetwode-Talbot. Harriet is the go-between for elderly, wise, Yemeni Sheikh Muhammad, a mystical salmon fisherman with an Estate in the highlands of Scotland. The salmon project, becomes the most defining period of his life for scientific humanist Fred. Who records his deepest longings, along with the projects progress, in his diary.

I would have given this delightful novel five stars, had it not been for the combined use of interviews,newspaper reports, and Hansard. That approach could be somewhat irksome. Praise to the author for an otherwise, rattling good yarn. I would recommend the book to friends.

Good but labourous read
I liked this book in the end but found it difficult to get fully into it due to the way in which Paul Torday decided to set the novel out. After the first 100-so pages I started to get fully into the book and did enjoy it to a certain extent.

The way characters are portrayed, bumbling well meaning Dr Jones, cynical Maxwell and the prophetic and highly intelligent sheikh, was very good and it helped the story along well. (I find that in books that are written in letter, email, report etc form that characterisation can often be pushed aside but Torday managed to prove this idea wrong for the better).

It was funny but it was also sad, I felt for Jones and Harriet towards the end of the novel (although not for Mary Jones) and it was the way Torday made this happen that really wins my praise. Unfortunately the medium and the way that the story often dragged along was a disappointment.

3/5