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Here are stories of a life spent in pursuit of striped bass not only with rod and reel, but also with knowledge, wisdom and even love.

Readers quickly recognize the enthusiasm of someone writing about a particular sport or pastime in any depth. That certainly is the case with Daignault (The Trophy Striper), whose book describes over 40 years of surfcasting for the striped bass along the Atlantic coast. His experiences with the people he encounters and the places he visits and fishes from as he follows this avocation, and sometime vocation, make for intriguing reading. Entering his world puts a whole new perspective on the sport of surfcasting, a pastime that isn't as widely known as other kinds of fishing. As with most dedicated fishermen, Daignault puts much of himself into the search for stripers. While he has pursued several different occupations, his true love was earning a living as a commercial rod-and-reel striper fisherman. Some people may never find true satisfaction with their lives, but Daignault seems at peace with the world with his rod and reel in hand. While this book might seem to have limited appeal, it offers a fascinating discussion of a sport about which many still know little. By extension, it is a book about many long-term passions. Recommended for public and school libraries, particularly in the Atlantic seaboard states of the "striper coast."-William O. Scheeren, Hempfield Area H.S. Lib., Greensburg, PA

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The herds of striped bass that run along Cape Cod every summer have been a mainstay of commercial fishermen along the Northeast coast, as well as a lure for sporting fishermen. A machinist turned vocational teacher, Daignault was so taken with the sport he made a sort of vagabond family occupation out of school vacations, fishing the years of striper plenty in the 1960s and '70s from the beaches of southern Massachusetts. Casting single lines for fish from the shore through the night, Daignault, his wife and daughters worked 20-foot rods to catch striper bass that ran as large as five feet and weighed 50 pounds, often gathering 500 pounds of fish in a night. This catch earned him enough cash to stretch a schoolteacher's income over a growing family. Early on in his summer experiment, Daignault's "vacation job" as commercial fisherman clearly became his life's occupation, and the colorful band of Cape Cod striper fishers his trade union. There is a sort of Cape Cod Family Robinson quality glowing in this working-class memoir (Daignault's third account of his halcyon summers on the striper coast, following The Trophy Striper and Twenty Years on the Cape), which may warm readers not ordinarily interested in angling as a family passion. (Oct.) Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.