The Title is Misleading, but the Book is Very Enjoyable - Rated 
Having watched Chris Yates many times on the television, I decided to beg, steal or borrow his book, and I did, not the steal part, I hasten to add. As some of the other reviewers have said the title is a little misleading because it is not really a book on how to fish (which I was rather pleased about. Because learning how to fish from a book fills me with horror). The only way to learn how to fish is to actually fish, preferably with someone who knows what they are doing.
However, I digress. Yates is an accomplished angler, well known throughout the fishing fraternity and if I said that he was a little eccentric, I am sure he would not be offended. He has a liking for old fishing tackle, reels and rods and quite often fishes with them. He is I suppose the nearest thing we have got to a modern day `Mr. Crabtree' and the book is about how he likes to conduct himself when fishing. To the extent that the day out and the location seem to be more paramount than catching any fish. There should always be a little kettle on the boil on the camping stove and a bottle of wine cooling in the keepnet. This is a stroll down memory lane for many of us, but the match angler would probably hang himself from the nearest tree after reading this book. This is really about a way of life. The days when people had time to relax and enjoy their leisure time and not worry about how bad the traffic was likely to be going home etc etc.
How it feels to fish - Rated 
This is a wonderful little book. The title is more than a little misleading though. You don't learn how to fish, but you do learn how it feels to fish.
There is no "use this float and put the weights like that." There is however "mist rolling in, pots of tea and how it feels to pluck a perch from under those trees."
Its a series of anecdotes really. The view from the waterside. Every angler of whatever pursuation will love it. Even non-anglers will enjoy it for its meditations and atmospherics.
Yates if an amiable eccentric and a nice departure from the kit- obsessed testosterone crowd who seem to dominate angling books and TV programmes now. He fishes with ancient split cane rods and centrepin reels. And catches large fish.
or more exactly, how Chris Yates fishes - Rated
Don't be misled by the title of the book. It is not a how-to manual. It doesn't give away secrets, it doesn't tell you where to fish, how to fish or how to rig a trace and it doesn't go into detail on bait and tackle. It does tell you, in the first person, how Chris Yates fishes in a series of tales and memories of his childhood and youth. We hear of his friends who all seem to enjoy drinking tea and eating cake on the riverbank; we learn of his exploits in all sorts of weather and his aproach to stalking fish.
The central theme of the book shows how one can become obsessed with one particular species of fish. We discover how Chris Yates became interested in fishing, fished around the UK for various species of fish, and now how he has become infatuated with one species of fish - the perch.
An interesting read overall. An insight into British coarse fishing for any non-Brit who may be intrigued why the English drink so much tea, don't eat the fish they catch and why they get so excited over little river fish.
I already know how, at last I know why! - Rated 
As a keen angler myself, and indeed guilty of sometimes wanting to find a number of new 'quick fix ' methods of hooking monsters - I have now realised that I can be sometimes positively heathen in my approach.
Many people regard angling as a cruel sport, and that it should be up there with fox hunting, others merely fail to see the enjoyment of sitting by a riverbank or pool for hours staring at water!
I can understand both opinions and have spent many conversations attempting to dispell these attitudes and defend my pastime.
At long last I have a reliable source of support from Mr Yates.
His description of a day on the riverbank is gentle, original and honest and his recounting of childhood experiences that led him to fishing brings forth an innocence and appreciation that can so easily be lost in todays world of angling.
Not only does he respect his environment and turn it's descriptions into prose-like words, he also gives the fish character and very much accepts all creatures' rights to existence as much as humans.
In a way that only Chris Yates can write he manages to draw in the non-angler to this wonderful thing called nature and also to make regular anglers find their inner selves, and realise just what it is we are trying to do behind all these bite alarms, carbon rods and scientifically researched bait. (When it is possible to achieve so much more than a catch, with a whicker rod and a worm!).
I myself have felt very different on fishing days after reading this work, and though the title is misleading in the fact that is does not describe technique and 'how', the tranquility of the cover itself goes a long way to explaining 'why'.
So non-anglers - read this book and let it open your eyes a wonderful place called 'The Natural World', and regular anglers let it show you what you may have been missing!
Positively Eutopian, positively excellent!
A Living Legacy - Rated
In around one hundred years or so, people will talk of the great fishing writers.
Walton, Sheringham, Pitchford and Yates.
Lets enjoy him now.
Buy this book; read this book and tell all of your friends.
I don't fish, though my boyfriend does, and Chris Yates explains to me why.
A true classic.
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