Story of Fatherhood and Fly-fishing Catches the Big One
COM’s Ureneck wins National Outdoor Book Award with Backcast
Click the slide show to hear Lou Ureneck discuss the fly-fishing trip he chronicles in Backcast.
Backcast: Fatherhood, Fly-fishing, and a River Journey Through the Heart of Alaska, Lou Ureneck’s chronicle of the fly-fishing trip he took with his son when their family foundation was shaken, has won the 2007 National Outdoor Book Award (NOBA) in the Outdoor Literature category. The book, published in September by St. Martin’s Press, recounts Ureneck’s effort to reestablish a connection with his 18-year-old son after their relationship was damaged by divorce.
Throughout the memoir, Ureneck, the chairman of the journalism department at the College of Communication, pairs the physical trials of the trip with the emotional confrontations between father and son. “Backcast plays out like the long and splendid arc of a fly line,” the NOBA judges wrote. “The result is a realistic and heartwarming story of a father and his son — and a work of outdoor literature of the highest order.”
The National Outdoor Book Awards are a nonprofit educational program, sponsored by the NOBA Foundation, the Association of Outdoor Recreation and Education, and Idaho State University.