Experience the Joy of Fly Fishing: The Optimist's Guide to a Life of Adventure

Scrap: I enjoyed this book immensely. Every chapter was a new and interesting read about a different fly fishing experience with different species of fish.

United States on Dec 30, 2023

Derek Pine: If you love fly fishing, you’ll love the storytellers style of these real life experiences. Relatable and gives me some ideas of where I need to go fish.

United States on Dec 20, 2023

Paul MacDonald: The author visited lots of different fishing spots and had the same experiences I've had onmany occassions !

Canada on Sep 25, 2023

alan paterson: Told by a younger than usual angler for this type of book. Thoroughly enjoyed reading this.

United Kingdom on Sep 08, 2023

Scott Patchin: This book touched my heart with the vivid descriptions of people and places, and the honesty about what fly fishing experience looks and feels like. I am an avid fisherman and a passionate (but not highly skilled) about fly fishing. I have seen and felt everything the author described because I am often fishing alongside what I would call "real" fly fishing experts. Sometimes they are patient, and sometimes they make you feel little. :) This book captures all of that, and the reality that we all have skills and if learning and valuing the experience is always the goal - every hole gives us a story, even if it is not in a catch.

The second benefit of the book is how it describes 8 different experiences, some of which I have experienced, but many that I dream about (Patagonia). The author is so skilled at describing the whole journey that I felt like I was getting travel tips as well as fishing tips. This was an unexpected surprise for me because it was recommended by a friend as a fishing book. It provides lots of fishing details, and yet it is more that that because of the format of providing 8 different short stories.

I highly recommend this book and thank David...

United States on Mar 14, 2023

Alex: Great book which describes the up and downs of a flyfisher. Also gave me some ideas where to look for the next experience.

Germany on Dec 24, 2022

Paddy, West London: Well written and enjoyable. Wanted it to go on longer than it’s fairly brief form.

United Kingdom on Jun 06, 2022

Karl B|hler: Very poor delivery service

Germany on Jul 04, 2021

Edward B. Blau: Over far too many decades I have fly fished for many species and in many, many places and have read about the sport for the same number of years.
I fish in Wisconsin where we live and in other places that the author writes about including Montana and Andros Island in the Bahamas.
Coggins writes very well and his descriptions of places that I also have fished ring true.
Before I retired I had a very intense professional life where my margin of error was small.
I fly fished as a relief from that and I learned to be patient with myself, knew I was very good in a difficult profession so I quickly learned to stop beating up on myself for a bad cast and did not look upon the guides as judgmental but as teachers.
I grew a little weary reading about the author's angst about a lost fish, worrying about what the guides may think or a bad cast.
Aside from that the book was very enjoyable.

United States on Jun 03, 2021

Steve Woit: The sport of fly fishing is blessed with some of the most storied literature on the planet. To say that David Coggins' new book is an ode to the sport and written with great style seems woefully inadequate to describe the arrival of what I can only call "A New American Fly Fishing Classic."

This book had me at the title: "The Optimist" is probably one of the best fishing book titles ever, and "The Case for A Fly Fishing Life" one of the best subtitles to describe our collective obsession--as in: "There is always room in an angler's life for another obsession."

It is a difficult assignment to treat a subject so inclined to snobbishness and elitism, but David Coggins breaks the code with a good-natured approach to his subject that is both instructive and humorous. He covers the basics while gently piercing the veil of secrecy surrounding the storied waters that hold trout, salmon, striped bass and bonefish, from Montana to Canada to New York to the Bahamas and the hallowed rivers and streams of England and Argentina.

The book is as much about the fly fisher's psyche as about the techniques, methods and equipment that the fly fisherman uses to stalk his favorite...

United States on May 06, 2021