The steelhead trout, totem game fish of the Pacific Northwest, has inspired a regional writer's shelf that might include the best of angling literature: Zane Grey, Roderick Haig-Brown, Steve Raymond and Edward Hoagland. Checchio (A Clear, Well-Lighted Stream) jumps to the head of the form with this short "steelhead quest," just the sort of rookie yarn and quixotic on-the-water travelogue that angling markets love. There are plenty of fishing tales on the fabled rivers of (mostly) British Columbia and Oregon, but the action is seamlessly blended with intelligent observations about the mythos of migratory fish for anglers and for the region. The 20th-century dilemma of managing salmon and other wild fish as natural systems under competing logging, water and power use—never mind for recreation—has been well-reported lately, yet Checchio shows that it's still worth discussing over dinner with him at the Streamboat Lodge on the Umpqua. The title notwithstanding (B.C.'s Skeena is "the river of mists"), Checchio writes with none of the obtuse sentimentality and formulaic conservation pleas that today's angling writers rely on. He deftly evokes a time, a vibrant natural system and a culture that may be gone before we learn how to preserve such rivers. Migratory steelhead and salmon are the teetering icons of wilderness in the Pacific Northwest; this is a cold-eyed look at the last truly wild fishery in North America. (Oct.)
