Streams of Consciousness: Hip-Deep Dispatches from the River of Life - Hardcover

Hull, Jeff

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1592289886 ISBN 13: 9781592289882

Publisher: Lyons Pr, 2007

Synopsis

This collection is about fishing and everything but fishing. From the trout streams of Montana to the shores of New England, to the spring creeks of Chile’s Patagonia to the clear waters of Belize, Hull regales readers with humility and hilarity. In Montana he fishes fabled trout streams in twilight; the day runs down while his brother’s time literally runs out. In a small pond on the grounds of a psychiatric hospital in Kansas, he fishes, pulling bluegill out of the water along with an essential part of his identity. While Hull fills his dispatches with wonderful characters and spectacular fishing stories, he offers searing insight into the human heart.

About this title

About the Author

Jeff Hull has written for The Atlantic Monthly, Audubon, National Geographic Traveler, Outside, Travel & Leisure, National Geographic Adventure, and many more. He has guided in Montana and in remote bonefish flats in the South Pacific and teaches magazine writing at the University of Montana School of Journalism. He is the author of Pale Morning Done (Lyons Press, 2005).

From the Inside Flap

Every once in a great while, a new writer comes along who brings to outdoor literature a freshness and electricity that rivals not only the best of the genre, but those writers who transcend the genre?from Ernest Hemingway to Jim Harrison. Jeff Hull is such a writer. In Streams of Consciousness, he regales readers with humility and hilarity, taking us from the robust trout streams of Montana to the salty shores of New England to the spring creeks of Chile s Patagonia and beyond. He is writing about fly fishing?and everything but fly fishing. In Montana he fishes fabled trout streams in twilight, the magical time, when the day is running down and while his brother s time is literally running out. In Belize, Hull, obsessed with permit, attempts to catch a grand slam: tarpon, permit, and bonefish all in one day. In a muddy Ohio creek, as a tube-sock wearing teen, Hull and his friends catch bass and navigate the murky waters of love, respect, and hormones. In a small pond on the grounds of a psychiatric hospital in Kansas, he fishes, pulling bluegill out of the water along with an essential part of his identity.
Streams of Consciousness is not just fine writing about sport and filled with wonderful characters and spectacular fishing adventures, though it is that, too. These gemlike encounters shimmer with insight. Like bolts of lightning, they illuminate all that surrounds them. You don t need to have ever picked up a fly rod for these pieces to speak to you; you need only to have an appreciation for literature that works its way deeper into your consciousness long after you ve closed the covers of the book.

Reviews

Starred Review. As in Hull's novel Pale Morning Done, fishing really is a lens through which Hull sees the world. And fortunately, the waters for this former fishing guide certainly run deeper than the Montana rivers and coastal flats where he fishes. Almost all the chapters, which read as individual essays, begin like an average outdoor magazine article, with Hull "obsessed with Permit" or chasing a record blue shark or a "legendary giant trout." But what makes these tales special and gives them the intensity of fine literature is that real life always intervenes in Hull's idyllic fishing trips. Sometimes the interruption is as simple as a missed connection with a dream girl at a bar or as newsy as environmental conservation, but oftentimes they are more dramatic, like the death of Hull's brother or his own stay in a psychiatric hospital. These pauses lend Hull's work a melancholy air, but they also allow Hull to outline his hope that life can also change for the better. Unlike many fly-fishing writers, Hull isn't afraid to let his guard down. Add in Hull's ability to bring his scenery and characters to life, and you have a book that will burrow into the hearts of anglers and nonanglers alike. (Jan.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

In these ruminations on fishing and life, Montanan Hull shows that it's hard to fish well--and harder still to be a good person. His eloquent essays cover a wide range of fresh and saltwater fishing across an equally wide span of the globe: trout and grayling streams near Montana, trout in Patagonia, striped bass and sharks in New England, white bass in Ohio, and bonefish in Belize and Tahiti. Of particular note is the essay "Wonder Time," an exquisite reflection on the pleasures of fishing at dusk. Hull is a strong fisherman but confronts difficult times off the water. He writes movingly about his brother's long struggle with anemia and cancer, and he explores with remarkable candor his own attempted suicide and psychiatric treatment. He also writes with self-deprecating humor about his difficult encounters with clumsy anglers, with poor men who fish to live rather than for sport, with Blackfeet Indians on their reservation. A fine example not only of outdoor literature but also of creative nonfiction. John Rowen
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Edition details

• Publisher: Lyons Pr
• Publication date: 2007
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1592289886
• ISBN 13: 9781592289882
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 198