• The Founding Fish

  • By: John McPhee
  • Narrated by: John McPhee
  • Length: 14 hrs and 11 mins
  • 4.3 out of 5 stars (130 ratings)

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The Founding Fish  By  cover art

The Founding Fish

By: John McPhee
Narrated by: John McPhee
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Publisher's summary

Few fish are as beloved, or as obsessed over, as the American shad. Although shad spend most of their lives in salt water, they enter rivers by the hundreds of thousands in the spring and swim upstream heroic distances in order to spawn, then return to the ocean.

John McPhee is a shad fisherman, and his passion for the annual shad run has led him, over the years, to learn much of what there is to know about the fish known as Alosa sapidissima, or "most savory". In The Founding Fish McPhee makes of his obsession a work of literary art. In characteristically bold and spirited prose, inflected here and there with wry humor, McPhee places the fish within natural history and American history. He explores the fish's cameo role in the lives of William Penn, Washington, Jefferson, Thoreau, Lincoln, and John Wilkes Booth. He travels with various ichthyologists, including a fish behaviorist and an anatomist of fishes; takes instruction in the making of shad darts from a master of the art; and cooks shad and shad roe a variety of ways. Mostly, though, McPhee goes fishing for shad, standing for hours in the Delaware River in stocking waders and cleated boots, or gently bumping over rapids in a chocolate-colored Kevlar canoe. His adventures in the pursuit of shad occasion the kind of writing, at once expert and ardent, in which he has no equal.

©2002 John McPhee (P)2002 Recorded Books
  • Unabridged Audiobook
  • Categories: History

Critic reviews

"McPhee reaffirms his stature as a bold American original. His prose is rugged, straightforward, and unassuming, and can be just as witty. This book sings like anglers' lines cast on the water. It runs with the wisdom of ocean-going shad." (Publishers Weekly)
"McPhee is in great form here, as informative as always but also funny, unusually self-revealing, and quite passionate." (Booklist)

What listeners say about The Founding Fish

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

Read and released.

Reading McPhee is like watching a brilliant tennis player you've followed for years. I know his moves. I can even predict most of his methods, but I keep coming back to watch him put it all together. He is masterful. He makes the incredibly difficult work of narrative nonfiction seem effortless. Beautiful prose swims right up to McPhee and jumps into his net or flops right into the pages of his book.

Once again McPhee matches a microhistory (the American Shad) with great characters (biologists, fishermen, sportsmen, presidents, even his wife) present and past, amazing locations and takes you completely through the subject. You emerge from tail of the book knowing the history, the biology, the life, the death, the taste and the debate surrounding America's founding fish. He shows you every single bone in a boney fish. Read and released.

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18 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

mixed thoughts

I enjoy nonfiction and John McPhee. As an audiobook, it's kind of neat to have John McPhee read it himself, but in printed book form it would be easier to skip over parts not of interest. This book contained many long fishing stories with too much minute by minute detail. Fishing fanatics might enjoy this - if that is you, then go for this book. I was expecting history, economics, science, and there was all that and much, much more. Making the darts, history of dams, biology of fish, deep sea fishing contests, many interesting topics and very comprehensive coverage. Now that I'm done, when I think back over what I learned, I do find it was worthwhile. But during the listening, I felt tortured at times.

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16 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars

bad audio

I just started this, and the reader (John McPhee) sounds awful. The sound engineers should have edited out all the breathing noises and the sound of his tongue arranging itself in his mouth. Awful. I'd really like to get my money back. My fault, I guess, because I didn't listen to the preview.

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7 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars

asleep in the deep

John McPhee's books often start slow, but become steadily more and more interesting and informative as you go along. The Founding Fish mixes his obsession with fishing for shad with info on this amazing little fish, and it's importance in American History. Unfortunately the reader sounds like the slow kid in your third grade reading circle, making McPhee's slow story development unbearable. I can't get through it even after 4 determined tries. If you like McPhee, try The Pine Barrens, or Oranges, or Basin and Range, or The Delta Pumkinseed.

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6 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars

Know what you are getting into

Hearing an author read his or her own work seems always to be somewhat of a trade off. You can hear a deeper connection with the material but the overall quality of the reading is not equal to some of the more skilled and practiced readers of audiobooks. It is clear that John McPhee is obsessed with shad. With such a long book on one subject I hoped for more history and cultural history (there is some) along with all the fish stories. Too much detail on things like shad skeletons and ichthyology for me. In printed format I could have easily skimmed those parts. In audiobook format that dull minutiae was unavoidable.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

I knew nothing about shad and now I know lots!

I really enjoyed this book and generally enjoyed the author reading it, but what is going on in the studio afterwards? They did nothing to get rid of noises made by McPhee while reading. The 3 stars for performance is on the audiobook producer!

I loved the book. I knew nothing about shad and gave never eaten any. No shad come up the river near where I live - it has been dammed since the 1630s. The dam itself is historic.

McPhee is a genius at making what could be a boring subject interesting. He weaves his experiences, science, environmental concerns, history, and the fishing experiences of others into this book. He talks about George Washington's troops, fish brought out west, the roe of the female shad, fish hatcheries, and more. Sometimes there is a little humor that comes in a McPhee book.

After listening to the book I'd like to try eating shad, but not roe. He's got recipes at the end for anyone who wants to try cooking.

If you can handle the lack of audio engineering, listen a little faster for better results, then enjoy the book.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Entertaining from/for all angles/anglers

This book was so well done! I loved how John wove personal stories with both humorously ironic and historical fact. He displays all angles of angling with a seemingly unbiased but clear and respectful position of his own. Not really sure how he did that? I think I was smiling through every chapter. This is a guy I’d love to crowed on the river and become a character of his story lol! Highly recommend!

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Warning: Do not read if hungry

Wonderful writing, as always, but oh so unfair! The last chapter will have you buying a plane ticket to where such foods are served!

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

Really good, nerdy fish book!

I really enjoyed this book. It was fun, super nerdy if you can consider fishing nerdy, and very insightful. Must listen at 1.25 speed, otherwise it is very slow. But at that speed, the author, who is clever and witty, sounds good.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

audiobook that changed me as a fisherman forever

the audibook itself is like listening to an older gentleman tell random stories for hours and hours. At first I couldnt get a grip on this, but as I continued to listen closely I learned some interesting perspectives that I have never been exposed to. It made me a more complete and educated fisherman, and i would recomend it to anyone, its slow at times but honestly I cant wait to listen to it again. I often found myself going back and playing a section again and again. john mcphee isnt your average audibook narrator but I am glad to have him presenting the story as he orginaly intended.

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