A Fish Come True: Fables, Farces, and Fantasies for the Hopeful Angler
What if, now that science has identified and described so many interesting worlds orbiting other stars, you could travel to them, fly rod in hand, to check out the fishing opportunities there?
What if you were given a ticket to ride a time machine to any fishing destination you chose, any time, anywhere, in the historical past?
And—perhaps even more appealing and scarier—what if some gifted fly tier discovered the holy grail of that craft, a fly that always worked, so that you could catch a fish on every cast?
A Fish Come True: Fables, Farces, and Fantasies for the Hopeful Angler explores these intriguing questions and many others in "What-if Stories" that should appeal to any fisherman whose imagination has ever wandered out along the borders of the sport's most remote and eccentric possibilities. Deftly employing a variety of genre fictional styles, Paul Schullery takes us on a tour of fishing's hope-filled fringes to consider both the potential delights and the goofy consequences of getting what we hope for.
Here's an excerpt from the introduction to A Fish Come True:
"I imagine most of us find it satisfying, even unavoidable, to exercise our wildest hopes about fishing. It's yet another way we can enjoy this wonderful sport even when we're not out there blundering around on our favorite stream. And in that spirit I offer this book, which explores at least a few of the hopes, fears, laughs, surprises, and ironies that might arise from the fulfillment of our angling dreams.
"Having only a passing interest in considering such possibilities in any disciplined or lofty way—what is a happy ending, anyway?—I have instead gone for atmosphere, provocation, and whimsy. And though as I read these stories now it looks to me like whimsy mostly wins out, there are spots in some of them that do aim for something a little more substantial. When the final story in the bunch, 'Shupton's Fancy,' was originally published, the reviewers and blurbers were gratifyingly generous about its depths. Someone even used the wondrous term 'literature.' I couldn't ask for more than that."