Surf Fishing the Atlantic Coast

Rating:
Summary: Excellent basic intro to this extraordinary sport
Review: Some of us need an excuse - or at least an objective - in order to go out and face nature in its real, raw form. One of the purest forms of these endeavours is surf fishing. What the author describes here is a sport that can put you on a cold, wild beach in October, face to a raging surf, going manu a manu with a fish that may be as strong as you are. Recreating the ancestral challenges we all once faced to put food on the table doesn't get any more real than this.But there is no romance or deep reflection about the nature of things or why fly-fishing is like life in this book. It's nuts and bolts. And its about real surf fishing - not dropping a line while your at the beach. And its filled with the kind of information that - if you are really going to do it - you are really going to need.And remember - deflate those tires or they may never find you.

Rating:
Summary: Needs More Illustrations!
Review: This otherwise fine book suffers from the lack of meaningful illustrations, particularly with respect to casting. Verbal descriptions of casting procedures are impossible to follow; Burnley's descriptions are no exceptions. This book is apparently not for the novice, in that there few pictures or descriptions of surf fish species (if there was a single picture of a blue, then I must have missed it). More and better illustrations of standard rigs would be helpful. And why did he include a 3-page, 8-step illustration of the Bimini twist knot, when he went on to explain that it is seldom used in actual fishing conditions? On the plus side, Burnley hits about all related topics, from lunch to tackle, from buckets to buggys, from Maine to Florida. It is very well written, obviously from his own significant experience. As either a guide or a fishing buddy, Eric Burnley is probably one heck of a good teacher.