LORDS OF THE FLY

A fascinating look at the narrow but wild world of tarpon fishing.

Forbes and Garden & Gun contributing editor Burke indulges in his boundless enthusiasm for fishing, showing how storytelling is an important part of the fishing experience. “In angling, as in life,” writes the author, “it is the ones that get away that haunt our dreams, that push us over the brink into a lustful madness. And Homosassa [Florida] was the first place in these anglers’ lives where, hot damn, those dreams just might come true.” In Sowbelly (2005), Burke chronicled the search for a record largemouth bass. Here, he focuses on the less-known arena of tarpon fishing, discussing its most prominent practitioners as well as the extraordinary fish itself, a behemoth that can weigh more than 250 pounds and live to be 80. The book is also about a specific time and place—late-1970s to early-1980s Homosassa—and the colorful fishing culture that thrived within it. Burke brings readers to this infamous hot spot, where the biggest names in fly-fishing—including baseball star Ted Williams and a cadre of other tough characters—would converge to try and out-angle each other. But it wasn’t only about the purity of fishing. “The egos involved made the atmosphere electric,” writes the author. “The difficulty of the quest made it legitimate. And the drugs and the women that were swept in with the tide made it all veer out of control.” By the mid-1990s, the Homosassa tarpon craze began to peter out. Climate-unfriendly governance in Florida led to an ecological crisis that helped drive the tarpon from Florida’s coastal waters. Burke constructs the rise and fall of this unique fishing tale with impressive narrative control and an obvious reverence for its vivid characters.

Ably captures the swagger, attitudes, and angling derring-do of a golden age of fishing history.