Bob Romano
Bob Romano has owned a cabin in the Rangeley Lakes Region of western Maine for more than thirty years. In his latest book, The River King – A Fly-fishing Novel, the writer returns to this region of the country that has a rich sporting tradition. This is Bob’s fifth book set in western Maine. The tenth-anniversary edition of Shadows in the Stream, Bob’s book of essays about fly fishing, is often used by anglers as a guide to fishing the Rangeley Lakes Region.
Bob is also the author of the Rangeley Lakes trilogy that includes North of Easie, which won second place in the 2010 Outdoor Writer’s Best Book Contest. Romano’s essays and short stories have appeared in various anthologies, including Christmas in the Wild, Fresh Fiction for Fresh Water Fishing, and Wildbranch: An Anthology of Nature, Environmental, and Place-Based Writing. His most recent book, The River King is published by West River Media. More information about his books can be obtained by going to his website: forgottentrout.com.
Author Articles
Easing Back into Our Old Ways
Ask the trout of Bonnie Brook about their politics and they might tell you they are of the conservative persuasion. They’ll proudly describe growing up from eggs spread naturally by their parents. No hatchery trucks pulling up by the side of the road. No official opening day or closed season. No need for state interference. What they don’t tell you is...
Land of Fishing Legends
It was the mid-eighties. I was dating this blue-eyed beauty who accompanied me on a nine-hour drive from our suburban homes in New Jersey to the western edge of Maine’s North Woods. Turning off the macadam and onto dirt and gravel, we caught glimpses of a lake, mist swirling over its surface. I navigated around exposed rock, over rusted culverts, and...
Looking Back
The long-handled net leans in the corner of the porch. Our fly rods lie snug in their tubes, the reels in their cases. The old Grumman is chained to the spruce tree. The outboard winterized. The generator has been stored for winter, water drained from the cabin’s pipes. Sheets hang from the windows. Back home, snow spits down from a leaden sky. Trish...
The Fighter Still Remains
The previous evening the old man had sat on a bench while watching a black bear, a little one and most likely born the winter before last, wade into the pond beside his cabin. The young bear sought to escape the humidity and rising temperature. With water rippling around its neck, it also found temporary refuge from a cloud of flies, gnats, and...
The Shadow King
I first saw the fish the previous summer. It was on a Monday night, Memorial Day. Caddis had begun hatching a little before seven. Small fish splashed throughout the pool as they followed the tan-colored insects toward the surface. Caddis are one of nature’s more curious creatures. Larvae of these insects build homes of tiny branches, stones, and other...
In the Land of Nod
Bonnie Brook is as much a state of mind as it is a clear running stream that is home to a wild strain of trout. It is always with me. Perhaps after all these years, it’s become a part of me. Lying in bed, I can sometimes hear the roar of its current after an early-spring spate, or the cheerful laughter of its runs when the lilacs are in bloom. Sometimes...
February Thaw
As I grow older the winters seem to last longer. With the temperature rising into the forties on this first week of February, I tramp through melting snow in my Sorrels, the hood of a sweatshirt pulled tight over the tattered bill of my baseball cap. While collecting an armful of billets, I hear the patter of water dripping off the roof of the lean-to...
"Close Encounters of the Natural Kind"
Seated here beside the woodstove, rain mixed with hail pinging against the windows, I’ve been thinking about Thoreau’s statement that “Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after.” Izaak Walton certainly knew this. That may be the reason his book has endured down through the centuries. Perhaps John...
There and Back Again
As a young man, I read Hemingway and Steinbeck, Harrison, and McGuane. Along the way, the fly-fishing raconteur Richard Brautigan brought tears to my eyes while the rabid environmentalist Edward Abbey had me raising my fists in outrage. I took to heart the words of Gary Snyder, the acclaimed poet-turned-Buddhist, found in his thought-provoking book...
"Silver Trout"
The skies have remained gray all week. They match the landscape as well as my mood. Juncos flit among the cedars like the first snowflakes of the winter that looms ahead. A few sparrows shuffle over the lawn. They’re searching for seeds scattered by the chickadees and titmice visiting the feeder that hangs from a metal post outside my window. Even with...
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