Customer Reviews

The Legendary Neversink: A Treasury of the Best Writing About One of America's Great Trout Rivers

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"The Legendary Neversink" is a keeper.

15 years ago I learned that The Neversink River in the Catskill Mountains of New York is where dry fly fishing was introduced in America. It was developed and spread throughout the county until "the Catskill School" became the American School. This book offers further proof that it would be hard to name a sportsman, naturalist or conservationist who did not explore the river, try his hand at fishing it and later write about it.
Wonderfully illustrated, Askins has blended over twenty essays about the Neversink River (written by these individuals over the span of more than 100 years) into a thrilling history of the environment, the explorers and innovators, the economy and the political struggles which threatened and ultimately preserved it for our generation. Every chapter, whether it is a how-to-do-it, an adventure well remembered, or an hilarious tale of men (or women) interacting with nature, is great reading.

Much of what is reprinted here could be accurately described as having little or nothing to do with the Neversink; many pieces seem to have been selected merely because their authors were somehow associated with the Neversink or were known to have fished the river. Furthermore, Askins presents an entirely one-sided and misleading view of the "gorge controversy," which involved the acquisition of hunting and fishing rights in a portion of the Neversink gorge by the State of New York that ultimately allowed the public recreational use of the gorge. Although some of the pieces are by significant American angling writers, this is not the way to learn about the Neversink.