Crosscurrents

Jim Babb is one of the most eccentric and riveting new voices to be heard in the world of fly fishing in many years. From his early days growing up in a small East Tennessee town to his migration through Brahmin Boston to the backwoods of Maine (where he built his own house, by hand), Babb's story is as unique as it is brilliantly told.He explores his first fly rods in "Blue Collar Cane"; his early use of the wet fly; and the expeditions he made for bream. Always, he fly fishes with a maverick genius, building a way of seeing and experiencing the world of fly fishing that is all his own, and that carries him from the ponds of Maine to great fly-fishing opportunities throughout the world as editor of Gray's Sporting Journal. (5 1/2 x 8 1/4, 224 pages)