Bücher von John Holt

"If you appreciate the pristine beauty of the wilderness, the quiet trickle of a trout stream, or the bowl of the endless sky, you'll want to read these epistles by John Holt on his love and awe of Montana." - George Davidson, Zoo in a BookA consummate outdoorsman, John Holt has culled this marvelous collection of his articles and musings from a number of publications. It's like a philosophical travelogue, fishing and surveying the wilderness with a man who knows a brown trout from a bull trout from a golden trout. "Unlike an athlete who is usually finished by 40, writers can continue to grow and mature provided they work at it and don't bow down and worship the twisted god alcohol as I did some years ago. I'm still alive, mad as a hatter, mad as hell about the destruction of wild country and still trying to learn how to speak my native tongue."

"From brown bags to junk, inside angles to being crazy pissed off, John Holt wraps his emotions and insights into poetry that you will mesmerize and intrigue..."- Marcy Birdweather, Marcy's MusingsHolt is more commonly known for his prose -- novels like Plain Crazy in Paradise, Blown Away Under the Big Sky, and The Lost Patrol, or fact-filled articles in such publications as Men's Journal, Fly Fisherman, and Crossroads. He likes writing about the Great Outdoors, the beauty and savagery of nature, pastoral sojourns into the wild. But here Holt reveals another side of himself -- the poet. Here are nearly three score of his poems, which like his books show a mastery of language and an introspection that touches both mind and spirit.

"Westerners have come in all sorts - ranchers, frontiersmen, gold miners, gunfighters, even singing cowboys. John Holt gives us a poet, lamenting the passing of the West. His character's poems equal the story he tells."- Hollis George, editorial director and anthologistThe West has been celebrated with songs, words and photographs for well over 100 years. This novel is about poet John Wesley Gill, who lives in the Sweet Grass Hills, and his struggle to come to grips with the changing West as he also decides to resurrect his writing career through good deeds and very dark ones including murder. The book is a reflection of his travels. Gill's poems define his road experiences and this lyricism is reflected in the narrative that takes him along rough roads that lead to wild, out-of-the-way high plains mayhem and desolate locations.

"The best book about fly fishing since A River Runs Through It. Makes me dream of rainbow trout and cold streams and remote wilderness landscapes ..." ¿ Edward Squires, Not Quite Novellas"It's now been more than fifty years that I've been fishing, and roaming and loving Montana and the rest of the northern high plains. Lines on maps don't mean a damn thing to good country or to me. Montana flows into Alberta and British Columbia and Wyoming. The western Dakotas are the same place as Eastern Montana only with different names. Land is connected, not defined by human limitations. I first thought of writing and compiling this book while working a stream that wound through a brushy, tall-grass valley at the base of the Pryor Mountains last summer. Wild rainbows fought for the chance to engulf the Elk Hair caddis I was using. Beautiful healthy, small, colorful fish. Early afternoon was now sunset, the hours passing in an instant. And this made me remember the first trip to Montana in the sixties and the intervening hundreds of thousands (come to think of it. maybe more than a million) of miles I've wandered checking good, bad and indifferent water hanging out in serene isolation all over the place during the past half century. That time also passing in an instant that also times seemed eternal."

"John Holt's writings make the stark beauty of wilderness lands seem as real as if you're standing there on a high plateau with him. His characters are sunburnt, wind-blistered real. The harsh reality of living off the land offers a pleasure all its own. And death is always a integral part of Holt's landscape."- Nick Teranzi, Online Critics CornerJack Graves lived off the land, hunting and fishing and making his own way in this harsh, dry country that lay well away from cities. Free. Lonesome. No rules. But then his solitude is interrupted. Dark Star helicopters hovering over Mad Woman Gulch. Fires. Dead men. What was happening to his beloved Montana wilderness? Coal mining, that was nature's enemy. Meanwhile, Dark Star went about the business of punching the line through, hopefully before the winter weather, ugly storms screaming down from the arctic, closed in sometime in November. Piles of steel railroad ties, miles of heavy steel track, powerful graders, earth hauling rigs the size of houses, lots of explosives, track-laying machinery, D-11s, all of this stuff began accumulating in the company's yard. Would his life ever be the same?

I'm not a gambling man. I mean life's one big gamble ain't it. The odds are stacked against you, you just can't win. You know there are some people who will do anything to make sure that they win, even if it means eliminating anyone or anything that stands in your way. They only bet on a sure thing .... A DEAD CERTAINTY.

The name's Daniels, Jack Daniels - just like the whiskey you know. I'm a Private Detective. And I can't help butting my nose into other people's business. It's what I do. You get used to it. It becomes a way of life almost. After a while it comes natural to you, automatic, like breathing, or eating, although not quite as enjoyable. It's a habit that I just can't break. I just can't help it. But sometimes it can lead you into trouble .....

Tom Kendall had been with the 32nd Precinct, New York Police Department for just under ten years. But now he wanted a change. Now he wanted to start his own Private Detective Agency. He had grand ideas. He wasn't interested in just any old case. Oh no, he would handle only the big time cases, the expensive ones. He would be able to take his pick, the ones that he wanted, where the stakes were high and so were the rewards. He knew exactly the kind of case that he wanted. Anything else would not do, and it would just be turned down, flat.

The lake was flat and calm, with barely a ripple. Its dark waters glistening, reflecting the moonlight as though it were a mirror. Fritz Marschall knew that neither he, nor his friend, should really have been there. They, like many others before them, had been attracted to the lake by the many rumors that had been circulating. He thought of the endless stories there had been, of treasures sunken in, or buried around the lake. He recalled the stories of the lake being used to develop torpedoes and rockets during the war. Looking out across the dark water, he wondered what secrets were hidden beneath the surface.

This 1795 work describes the geography, climate and soils of Lancashire, and its land holdings and land use, noting the manufacturing as well as the agricultural areas. It provides a detailed examination of the livestock, agrarian and horticultural products of the county, and is a fascinating resource for social and agricultural historians.