With the weather in Alaska sticking stubbornly to the definition of winter and the state of my travel budget lying somewhere between no way and not in this lifetime, I’m resigned to the fact that the closest I’ll get to fly-fishing over the next few months is a comfortable chair and a good book.

Luckily, there are several outstanding angling titles on the market this holiday season, and due to the phenomenon of the Christmas gift certificate, I now own them. And in the spirit of sharing, I thought I’d share my list with others who might be similarly snow-bound and sick of it.

ALASKA FISHING: The Ultimate Angler’s Guide

by René Limeres and Gunnar Pederson

Without a doubt, Limeres and Pederson penned the ultimate Alaska angling guidebook years ago; this deluxe third edition simply improves upon the original, and not in the usual new-photos-and-cover-mean-new-edition sort of way. Written by some of Alaska’s top fishing experts, this latest version now covers all 17 major Alaska sport species, all methods (fly, spin, and bait), and all six regions of the state, with details on over 300 of the state’s most productive fishing locations.

It features all the ancillary information you’d need to plan a do-it-yourself trip as well, including run timing, regional climate conditions, basic regulations, and reference numbers for the appropriate USGS maps. In this edition there is also a bonus section with popular Alaska flies, an illustrated knot series, fish filleting how-to, and a comprehensive index that will make research easier for those of us who will refer to this compendium again and again.

SPRING CREEKS

by Mike Lawson

While Mike Lawson’s notable book concentrates on the catching of trout in his home waters, primarily the Henrys Fork and other nearby tailwaters, it’s really a boon to any angler interested in becoming a better trout fisherman. Lawson is one of the most respected and knowledgeable anglers in the industry, and in Spring Creeks he shares in his inimitable, forthright way what he has learned about finding trout, tempting them by matching hatches or not, stalking, playing, and landing them, and then letting them go.

Lawson has much to teach about mayflies, caddis, midges, terrestrials, and other aquatic insects, and these chapters provide an entomological background to go with the proven tactics for fishing dry flies, streamers, wet flies, and nymphs that he presents. Additionally, the chapters on casting and presentation are filled with the solid know-how of one who has refined the techniques over a lifetime. Hundreds of full-color photographs and Dave Hall’s instructive illustrations make this the definitive book on the subject.

FLY WATERS NEAR & FAR

by Barry and Cathy Beck

This book is trouble. I knew that the first time I cracked its cover, as while I randomly flipped through the pages I found myself silently calculating the costs of airline passage to Belize, the Bahamas, Tierra del Fuego, Venezuela and beyond. Worse, by the end of my first trip through the book, I’d decided there were certain things worth mortgaging to make these trips, not least among them a number of personal relationships.

Such is the power of the Becks’ brilliant angling photography. Captured in this lovely hardback tome are salt- and freshwater trophy fish of all species—bonefish, permit, tarpon, snook, jacks, striped bass, trout, salmon, char, and grayling. There are over 400 world-class photographs in all, detailing the beauty of destinations as diverse as Alaska and Christmas Island, the American West and coastal New England, New Zealand and Barry and Cathy’s beloved Pennsylvania. It’s a must-have for those days when the frost creeping across the windows just becomes too much.

ATLAS OF PACIFIC SALMON

by Dr. Xanthippe Augerot

The Atlas of Pacific Salmon, published by University of California Press and State of the Salmon Consortium, is the first map-based measurement of the condition of North Pacific salmon through their entire life cycle. It’s a beautiful book, well-researched and documented, and more than informative: just the thing for the one or two days during the winter that I’m feeling in need of intellectual stimulation, or a sobering assessment of the Pacific’s great treasures.

Among the book’s key findings are that nearly one in four Pacific salmon species studied are at risk of extinction, which may be news to many but certainly not anyone living along the coasts of Washington, Oregon, or California over the past few decades. Overall, the book’s conclusions are the results of ten years of research by Dr. Augerot, co-director of State of the Salmon, a joint program of the Wild Salmon Center and Ecotrust, and many of her colleagues from across the Pacific. Moving from a discussion of the relationship between indigenous peoples and salmon to current management issues and international treaties, the author escorts the reader through a gallery of maps: from native language groups of Pacific salmon to the economics of the international salmon trade. Dr. Augerot also discusses glaciation, landscape, climate, and other natural factors that have shaped and continue to shape salmon populations throughout the North Pacific.

With more than a dozen maps and photography by Pulitzer Prize finalist Natalie Fobes, the book catalogs human threats to salmon populations from an intriguing—but no less enlightening—angle.

THE HABIT OF RIVERS: Reflections on Trout Streams and Fly Fishing

by Ted Leeson

This book is not a new release; in fact, it’s already entrenched within the pantheon of angling literature as a bona-fide classic. However, I feel it’s worthy of mention here simply because hardly a winter goes by when I don’t feel the urge to re-read it.

Besides, Leeson isn’t releasing a new book this year, a fact for which he should be publicly flogged. But enough about the negligence of the author; The Habit of Rivers is a wry, insightful book detailing Leeson’s passion for rivers, trout, and fly fishing. It’s smart, soulful, and joyously lyrical—much like its author, I guess, except for the joyous, lyrical part.

“Thirty-five years ago, I toddled off to Turtle Creek with a cane pole and worms and returned with a six-inch smallmouth and a monkey on my back,” he writes in the book’s introduction. “I ate the bass and have been feeding the monkey ever since.”

In the years that follow, Leeson finds everything from salmon, steelhead, and trout, to drift-boats, art, insects, gravity, death, philosophy, books, fly-tying, and microbreweries, and he links them together with an intelligence that is provocative, witty, and illuminating. What emerges is a brilliantly original book about a certain vision of fishing, and fishing as a certain habit of vision. Or, in other words, I’d even read it during the season.

AMERICAN WATERS: Fly-Fishing Journeys of a Native Son

by Peter Kaminsky

In the three decades since catching his first fish, a Florida grouper, Kaminsky’s passion for angling has taken him on a voyage of self discovery across the country. In American Waters, the New York Times Outdoors columnist shares his fly-fishing journeys around what he calls “the fishingest country on earth.”

From the Ozarks to the Everglades, the Brooklyn waterfront to Yellowstone, the riptides of Montauk Point to the spring creeks of Montana, Kaminsky has fished some of the country’s most alluring waters. Whether he is pursuing tarpon in the Marquesas or the albacore of Cape Fear, the fishing tales recounted here convey the simple joy, timelessness, grace, and beauty that are to be found when casting a rod, and that makes them applicable to all of us who love to do it.

Clearly there are plenty of other choices on the market this season that will make fine company for even the coldest of winter nights. Some, like Simon Gawesworth’s definitive Spey Casting can even help make you a better angler. Still others, perhaps Ted Leeson’s latest book, Jerusalem Creek, provide the kind of companionship we won’t encounter again until the ice clears and the trout take an interest in the well-presented fly once more.