Crosscurrents: A Fly Fisher's Progress [Hardcover]

James R. Babb (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 1999

One of the most eccentric and riveting voices to be heard in the world of fly fishing has his say on just about every aspect of angling.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

"Oh boy. Another collection of navel-gazing essays from a baby boomer who got hold of a fly rod and a word processor and thought Eureka, I've found myself. And now wants to share." Any writer who can open a volume of, well, navel-gazing essays that self-effacingly has probably done some useful gazing, might actually have something worth saying, and has most likely manufactured a pretty good way of saying it. Fly-fishing is less avocation for James Babb, the editor of Gray's Sporting Journal, than a personal life choice. Born in the back of an ambulance in the parking lot of a Tennessee barbecue joint, he eventually resettled in New England. Through odd job after odd job, he found his equilibrium on the streams. When he wasn't out fly-fishing, he was thinking about it--and writing about it with unforced quirkiness and insight. In time, he built his own cabin in Maine with a trout pond to go with it. Why Maine? "I often say that I moved to Maine," he writes, "for the brook trout and Thoreau's wild North Woods and the joys of living in an inbred rural community where none of the cousins are mine." In a voice that's legitimately funny, magnetic, and unique, Babb has his say on just about everything from waders to wading staffs, British literature to knives and forks, which makes it a reader's adventure and an angler's catch. --Jeff Silverman

From Library Journal

Every few years one wonders if the fountain of talented essayists on fly-fishing is running dry. Then someone like Babb (editor of Gray's Sporting Journal since 1997) comes along. In this outstanding first book, his writing is literary and without pretense, mixing Thoreau and Poe with Dilbert and Zane Grey. His essays echo the work of well-known fly-fishing author John Gierach (Standing in a River Waving a Stick, LJ 2/1/99). Both are fine writers with wonderfully wry senses of humor to complement their talent for character development, observation, and description. A native of Tennessee now living in Maine, Babb writes of his Southern upbringing, setting down roots in the Maine woods, and his travels to exotic fly-fishing destinations. Included among these is a wonderful tale in which he sings 1960s television show theme songs on a guided trip down an unfished Canadian river. The best fly-fishing book of the year; for all libraries.
-Jeff Grossman, Milwaukee Area Technical Coll. Lib., Oak Creek, WI
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 224 pages
• Publisher: The Lyons Press; 1st edition (October 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1558219463
• ISBN-13: 978-1558219465
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.8 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,932,902 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Nicely done, July 9, 2000

By 

Former Rater (Nowhere) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Crosscurrents: A Fly Fisher's Progress (Hardcover)

Perhaps my title is insufficient. The progress is more or less identical to what any reasonable human being would want in the late 20th and early 21'st century.

A man of insight, regrets, decent moral grounding and capable of facing the difficulties of the realities of ecology (a/k/a Cranes and Rainbow trout) James Babb has molded a life worth living. Would that we were all so talented and perceptive. A biography more than a fish story is to be had here.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars more than fish, March 29, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Crosscurrents: A Fly Fisher's Progress (Hardcover)

Babb is one hell of a writer, and Crosscurrents is about more than just fish and antique split bamboo rods. It's about one man's spiritual journey from his boyhood home in the hills of East Tennessee to the lobsterman's life in the cold North Atlantic, to the hills of Maine, where he now resides. Plenty of adventures along the way, unforgettable characters, cultural observations, literary and historical allusions, and some really fine writing. I've never thrown a dry fly in my life, but I loved it, anyway. Bravo, Mr. James Babb!

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars A let down, November 30, 2008

By 

Carl D. Peterson - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Crosscurrents: A Fly Fisher's Progress (Paperback)

James Babb's River Music was great but Cross Currents, after a nice opening, is just another travel/fishing book. I was disappointed.