From Library Journal
Matthiessen, novelist and author of ac claimed nature works such as the Snow Leopard , was a commercial fisherman in the early 1950s on the South Fork of Long Island and has lived there since. As both knowledgeable insider and keen observer of a passing culture, he writes of the independent, tough, skilled members of a few large families who have fished those coastal waters for generations, but who no longer can make a living in the face of regulations, political restrictions, economic pres sures, and biased opposition from an gling groups. This is a somewhat melan choly portrait of frontier characters bowing to modernism, but it is also a masterful celebration of craft, of pride in one's work, of community, of endur ance. Finely written and highly recom mended for public and academic librar ies in the Northeast and for American studies collections everywhere. Photos not seen. Roland Person, Southern Il linois Univ. Lib., Carbondale
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From the Inside Flap
An eloquent portrayal of a disappearing way of life of the Long Island fishermen whose voices--humorous, bitter and bewildered--are as clear as the threatened beauty of their once quiet shore.
From the Trade Paperback edition.
