Casting At The Sun vs How To Fish

[MaggotDrowner]

This may contain spoilers.


I have just finished reading "Casting At The Sun" and I read "How To Fish" a while ago.

On reflection I think How To Fish is the better book. Both are written incredibly well and and the prose in places is amazing. Numerous times when reading both books I had to stop and read a particularly well written sentence or paragraph again. Both have passages and captures that stand out among the others in the book and I really enjoyed reading both.

My only criticism of Casting At The Sun is one I share with Yates as he reflects on his work after 10 years of writing it. He writes, in the foreword to the 1995 Medlar edition: "... but as a fishing book, I recognise certain flaws. There are, I realise, just too many fish.".

The best parts, without a doubt, are the chapters in which he rides around on his bike and finds new lakes to fish. My favourite chapters are the ones in which he finds and fishes that Haunted Pool. I find the later Redmire chapters a little lacking. Don't get me wrong, some of the captures from the Redmire pages are written fantastically and really are exciting to read- that first really big fish for example - but after that it turns more into a list of big carp captures. How To Fish on the other hand never got like that. There were fewer fish and it was more varied. I think it was a better book for it.

I was also shocked by the level to which obsession gripped him on his first stint as a member of the Redmire syndicate. To go without food is shocking and to result to eating bits of bait and attempting to catch trout in the river was a real surprise. I know he said he got addicted, but still... that's a whole other level to what I expected.

At first I really didn't understand the title of Casting At The Sun and wasn't keen on it, until it became clear why it was called that in the thrilling second to last chapter about the capture of The Bishop. It took until then for me to love the title.

Hopefully I'll read some more of his books soon. The next will probably be "The Lost Diary" which I have pre-ordered from Unbound.


If you have read both, which is your favourite? Also which other Yates books do you recommend I read next?

[Kingfisher]

"Casting at the sun" was the first book I ever read and it still remains my favourite. I'm going to have to read How to fish again now, to see whether or not you're right. I've just read too many of his books to be able to differentiate between them and my memory has become clouded over what was written in which.

"Casting at the sun" remains at the forefront of my mind though. I think I'll always be biased over that one because a lot of the book actually took me into the story and I could visualize where he was because I'd actually been to the places he mentions. "Potatoes and Thunderstorms" was the bit of the book that shocked me most as it was written about my town's lake.



This is where he was fishing from, whilst his brother Nick was working at the Royal Welsh show in Builth wells 7 miles away. If my memory serves me correctly, there is even a piece in the book that tells of him fishing the river here and that would most likely have been my river here on the farm. As an aside, I think with Yates's work, it's that descriptive that it enables the reader to visualize where he is and be there with him whether or not they've actually been there before or not. It's just easier when you have actually been there. Whilst I was getting into Carp fishing, Chris was actually fishing Redmire and later writing the book after catching the Bishop. I was just following in his footsteps but was unaware of the fact as I hadn't actually read the book yet.
One thing that jumps out at me after what you've said about getting obsessed was the fact that myself and a mate fished two days solid after running out of drinks. To the point in fact where we were both dehydrated. So yes I can imagine someone eating their own bate.
"How to fish" has always taken a back seat to "Casting at the sun" for these very reasons "for me anyway". It's like a trilogy of good films, you'll always watch them all but remember the one that got you into them the most.

I'm not right here I know as all his books were good but I got the impression that Chris Lost his spark/passion after two or three books. As time goes by he seems to have less passion in his writing and I think it's because "Casting at the sun" was written just after catching the record fish, so does he still retain some of the passion of carp fishing and the "obsession" that it brought about. That's not to say that his other books aren't good because they are.

[Northern Eel]

Casting at the sun wins for me, I liked the fact that its more of a history book or autobiography than a an as it happens account/diary of fishing like how to fish.
After reading casting at the sun, I found the old tea gardens on google street view, it is indeed a shadow of its former self! (Like so many waters I fished as a child)

I enjoyed how to fish but preferred casting at the sun & the secret carp more.

But I really didn't enjoy nightwalk, not because it isn't a fishing book, I enjoy nature & wildlife & enjoy a good nightwalk, I just couldn't get into it.

[Wallys-Cast]

Casting at the sun is by far his best book in my opinion but I do like all his fishing related books, one in particular I really enjoyed was "Out of the blue".
I am with Northern Eel on Nightwalk, it just didn't do it for me.

Wal.

[Azur]

Two of my favourite books for different reasons. For me Casting at the Sun has a better ‘pickupability’ than How to Fish. If the weather has been unfavourable for example (or during the spring term at uni when I couldn’t get out to fish due to a heavy workload - as I’m sure you’re aware of MD!) I would often just pick a chapter at random and get lost in it. I did very much enjoy How to Fish, and it did make me rather keen to get out in search of an autumn perch, but I didn’t quite have the same connection with it. I think the experience of reading Casting at the Sun that bit more nostalgic maybe? The prose in How to Fish is fantastic however.

I think that Casting at the Sun is quite the opposite of being a list of big carp – every capture for Chris seems genuinely heartfelt and took a lot of dedication. Although Chris does capture a number of big carp (and small too), it is nothing compared to books such as ‘In Pursuit of the Largest’ by Terry Hearn – which is an amazing book – but the bloke seems to pull twenty pounders out left right and centre! I found Casting at the Sun to be much more engaging, with regards to carp captures, than books of ‘more successful’ (?) carp anglers where reading about their tally of bigguns gets a little dry.

[Dave Burr]

I think your post demonstrates your age MD. I don't mean that in a derogatory way, you just need to understand that when Casting was published Chris was well known and his approach was fresh and although traditional, it was also new.

I have read and re-read Casting and I feel it has lost a little of its lustre with time and familiarity. Maybe, as you say, there are too many fish but I also knew many of the tales from his previous magazine articles and from the point of view of rod Hutchinson. It does though, remain a favoured book. How to Fish is superb as it is about the essence of just being there and the potential that angling brings. I also rate it highly but it is just a re-jig of The Secret Carp but on a river chasing a perch. This does not devalue it in any way but for me Chris' best book by a short distance, is always going to be Secret. When it was released it was a new concept in fishing book written by an absolute master. I read it most years as the new season approaches as to read it in winter provokes such a yearning for the summer that it positively aches.

If you have yet to read Secret Carp then I envy you as you have an absolute joy awaiting you.

[Snape]

I think your post demonstrates your age MD. I don't mean that in a derogatory way, you just need to understand that when Casting was published Chris was well known and his approach was fresh and although traditional, it was also new.

I have read and re-read Casting and I feel it has lost a little of its lustre with time and familiarity. Maybe, as you say, there are too many fish but I also knew many of the tales from his previous magazine articles and from the point of view of rod Hutchinson. It does though, remain a favoured book. How to Fish is superb as it is about the essence of just being there and the potential that angling brings. I also rate it highly but it is just a re-jig of The Secret Carp but on a river chasing a perch. This does not devalue it in any way but for me Chris' best book by a short distance, is always going to be Secret. When it was released it was a new concept in fishing book written by an absolute master. I read it most years as the new season approaches as to read it in winter provokes such a yearning for the summer that it positively aches.

If you have yet to read Secret Carp then I envy you as you have an absolute joy awaiting you.

Interestingly Chris also feels the 'The Secret Carp' is a better book.
To quote him: "it is more from the heart, I think"

[NiceRoach]

Aquabatics © Chris Yates

[JohnL]

For me "How to Fish" is my personal favourite, It's just fishing for pleasure, no obsession or chasing monsters, just the pure enjoyment of fishing.

[Mark]

For me it is Casting at the Sun.