Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #7071 in Books
• Published on: 2007-05-31
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

Synopsis
"How to Fish" is an unabashed, unashamed celebration of the joys of fishing. It is about contentment, calm and solitude, rivers and river banks, losing track of time and, of course, the fish themselves. For those who already enjoy fishing it is a love letter to their art and for those who don't - yet! - it is an insight into a life spent getting up at the crack of dawn and, armed with rod and line, heading for water...

Customer Reviews

Absolute masterpiece
If there's a better book than this on fishing then I've not seen it. A joy from start to finish from our greatest living angling writer.

The Title is Misleading, but the Book is Very Enjoyable

Having watched Chris Yates many times on the television, I decided to beg, steal or borrow his book, and I did, not the steal part, I hasten to add. As some of the other reviewers have said the title is a little misleading because it is not really a book on how to fish (which I was rather pleased about. Because learning how to fish from a book fills me with horror). The only way to learn how to fish is to actually fish, preferably with someone who knows what they are doing.

However, I digress. Yates is an accomplished angler, well known throughout the fishing fraternity and if I said that he was a little eccentric, I am sure he would not be offended. He has a liking for old fishing tackle, reels and rods and quite often fishes with them. He is I suppose the nearest thing we have got to a modern day `Mr. Crabtree' and the book is about how he likes to conduct himself when fishing. To the extent that the day out and the location seem to be more paramount than catching any fish. There should always be a little kettle on the boil on the camping stove and a bottle of wine cooling in the keepnet. This is a stroll down memory lane for many of us, but the match angler would probably hang himself from the nearest tree after reading this book. This is really about a way of life. The days when people had time to relax and enjoy their leisure time and not worry about how bad the traffic was likely to be going home etc etc.

How it feels to fish
This is a wonderful little book. The title is more than a little misleading though. You don't learn how to fish, but you do learn how it feels to fish.

There is no "use this float and put the weights like that." There is however "mist rolling in, pots of tea and how it feels to pluck a perch from under those trees."

Its a series of anecdotes really. The view from the waterside. Every angler of whatever pursuation will love it. Even non-anglers will enjoy it for its meditations and atmospherics.

Yates if an amiable eccentric and a nice departure from the kit- obsessed testosterone crowd who seem to dominate angling books and TV programmes now. He fishes with ancient split cane rods and centrepin reels. And catches large fish.