For over a year and a half, I’ve been putting reviews of fly fishing books on YouTube. It has been a lot of fun to talk about new titles and share some of my favorite books from the history of angling. This has been a great way to augment the dozens of articles posted about fly fishing books from the past decade on this site.
But not everyone who looks at Casting Across clicks over to YouTube. So while some of the books I’m sharing below have been the subjects of full length videos, they are good enough to share again. I’ve enjoyed all four of these titles, and all of them are worth seeking out.
As I’ve done for all of the entries in my “Fly Fishing Books” series, I’ve spread the selections over three rough categories:
- Guide (regional, site specific)
- Technical (methods, locations, fly tying)
- Literature (novels, biographies, history)
Check out one kind of each book, why I suggest it, and a bonus read below. And follow the links in the headings to get a copy for yourself.
A good guidebook will give a novice fly fisher everything he needs to approach a new river: access, hatches, and other general local information. in Culton’s guide to the Farmington, you’ll get all that. But as he moves yard by yard down the 20+ miles of trout water, you’ll get loads of specific local information. Like other books in this series from Stackpole, Farmington seeks to be the authoritative survey of the river. The writing is clear and compelling. What’s more, it will make you want to wade into this central Connecticut water – whether you live minutes or hours away.
Introduction to Fly Fishing, by Michael J. Klimkos
If you’re teaching a class on fly fishing, you would do well to consider using Klimkos’ Introduction to Fly Fishing as a resource for yourself and your students. The book came about, in part, to serve a Pennsylvania fly shop’s educational needs. Written from a life of experience, it presents all the essential aspects of the sport in a time-tested way. Klimkos spent decades working with teens on and around the river. The content is not pretentious. It simply seeks to give you all you need to get fly fishing and get into fly fishing.
Water Lines: A Life on Marshes, Rivers, Seas and In the Rain, by Riverhorse Nakadate
Sweet. That is a word I would rarely apply to fly fishing books. But Riverhorse Nakadate’s Water Lines chronicles a sweet personal journey that he invites he audience to join him in revisiting. Expertly crafted, the 32 stories approach fly fishing and the outdoors from a holistic perspective. The coffee and the frogs and the clouds and the fish all matter. From Texas to the African coast: it all matters. Few angling books have been as enjoyable to read and contemplate in recent years as Water Lines.
Flywater: Fly-Fishing Rivers of the West, by Grant McClintock
“Coffee table book.” Because of its size and format, one could certainly consider Flywater as such. But when the content (both images and words) are quality, what is wrong with the moniker? McClintock captures the beauty and wonder of the American west’s famous fly fishing rivers in this robust volume. It is fun to flip through. It is good to read. It is another example of how there is something genuinely enjoyable about looking at large, high-quality images in your hands.
Want more book recommendations?
Take a look at a few dozen ideas over on this page.