Books for the Angler in Your Life

Journalist and historian Chuck McShane traces the triumphs and troubles of Lake Norman from the region's colonial beginnings to its modern incarnation.

On a muggy September day in 1959, North Carolina governor Luther Hodges set off the first charge of dynamite for the Cowan's Ford Dam project. The dam channeled Catawba River waters into the largest lake in North Carolina: Lake Norman. The project was the culmination of James Buchanan Duke's dream of an electrified South and the beginning of the region's future. Over the years, the area around Lake Norman transformed from a countryside of cornstalks and cattle fields to an elite suburb full of luxurious subdivisions and thirty-five-foot sailboats.

Currituck County, North Carolina, is famed as a place where hunters count down every hour until the opening of duck season. Land of the hunter, farmer and fisherman?all terms that have defined author Travis Morris Currituck is the well-loved home and stage to this latest collection of hunting and fishing exploits. Currituck native Travis Morris returns with a follow-up to the best-selling Duck Hunting on Currituck Sound with more tales of hunting, fishing and adventure. Complete with humorous stories of boyhood on the sound and a whole new collection of fishing and hunting expeditions, this book is a treasure. Whether or not one has ever watched a ?smoke of ducks? flying overhead in front of a cold January sunrise or pulled in enough catfish to nearly sink a boat, Morris's accounts of life on Currituck Sound are sure to delight.

From the sweltering summer heat to the biting winter chill, thousands of dedicated anglers flock to North Carolina's piers to cast lines into the salty depths, hoping to reel in anything from whiting and shark to the highly prized sheepshead, red drum and even the elusive king mackerel. Fishing pier enthusiast Al Baird recounts the history of these wind-worn structures, from the incredible story of the oldest pier in North Carolina to the tales of the destructive hurricanes that ripped through the Outer Banks. Discover how seaside towns have grown and changed while their piers remain the same, as Baird recounts the memories and accomplishments of the men and women who have visited and loved these slowly disappearing landmarks.