Thank you so much for the opportunity to read this book. However, I am no longer interested in pursuing titles on this subject

I have long been a fan of Jim Harrison's writing, mainly because he is such a dichotomous person. He is a craggy outdoorsmen and environmentalist, and at the same time extremely literate. His stories that have female main characters seem the most polarized to me, particularly Dalva and The Woman Lit by Fireflies. In this book he discussed these female characters, and how he believed the death of his teenage sister caused him to want to bring her back to life by creating a female characters in his writing. At the same time, I started watching a new documentary series by Ken Burns on mental health. Burns said his mother passed away when he was very young, and this circumstance helped shape his career as a documentary filmmaker. He credited his father-in-law, a psychologist, with a significant insight: "He told me that my whole work was an attempt to make people long gone come back alive."

Fantastic. Jim Harrison the man as recorded by Jim Harrison the writer is basically a refined version of Brown Dog, the character invented by Jim Harrison the author. Harrison’s prose on fishing, hunting and the outdoors reads like an essay adaptation of Hemingway’s Michigan tales. Harrison takes Hem’s Big Two Hearted and raises it with Montana brown trout, Mexican rooster fish and black marlin off the coast of Ecuador. He takes the drunken aspirations of Three Day Blow, imagining beating down the bottomlands, with actual endless bird hunts around Traverse Bay, the UP, Arizona and the Yellowstone valley. Harrison lived the life that Up in Michigan hints at, a simple and admirable existence tied to living off the land and not forgetting where you come from. He also casually name drops the many friends and acquaintances collected through a remarkable life writing in Hollywood and trotting across the globe. This collection made me want to rewatch the Parts Unknown episode he featured in and just listen to him and Bourdain shoot the shit again: two savvy and literary gourmands reflecting on higher issues than simply food and travel, yet somehow bringing back to the forefront the truth that perhaps nothing is actually higher than those simple pleasures truly enjoyed.

Where does one begin with Jim Harrison? He's best known today for his novellas, such as "Legends of the Fall" (adapted into the movie of the same name), although there's a lot to like in his full-length novels, too. His poetry was hit or miss for me, but it's in his non-fiction writing that I feel Harrison really found his groove. So, theoretically, a fat new collection of Harrison essays collected together for the first time should be right up my alley.

And it is...with one caveat. A number of the pieces here are introductions to other writers' books, or simply book reviews. Including these may thrill completists, but their inclusion left me scratching my head one too many times. Yes, as the LA Times noted, Harrison "can sweep a reader off her feet with his wordplay, even if he is just describing the weather.” But weather is universal; the writers and books he's talking about are not. Divorced from where they originally appeared, some of them feel like non-sequiturs.

Which brings me back to my original question. Where does one begin with Jim Harrison? While there's still plenty here to recommend for curious readers, I wouldn't begin here. I would begin with one of his novels, such as "The English Major" or "Returning to Earth." Any of his full-length memoirs would do as an introduction--"Off to the Side" is worth reading, even if you don't know who the heck Jim Harrison is (I didn't, when I picked it up). I'm glad Grove Press is putting this book out and continuing to honor Harrison's legacy. On my wish list would be a smaller, hand-curated collection of nonfiction, including excerpts from his memoirs, that I could thrust into new readers' hands and say READ THIS YA FILTHY ANIMAL.

I remember two or three decades ago reading all the fiction Harrison had published at that time. After reading this collection of short nonfiction, I’m tempted to read all the fiction again.

After I finished this book, I went back and made a list of my favorite pieces. One thing that struck me was that those favorites were spread out through his writing career, from 1972 to 2015, which seems a good sign to me. Since I’m not a fan of hunting or fishing, two of his favorite topics, it didn’t surprise me that my favorites were almost all on topics of writing, the environment, or travel in places which were important to me, from Michigan’s Upper Peninsula to Montana and Yellowstone.

On the other hand, I’ve seen reviews by people who liked that he wrote about hunting and fishing and strippers and big SUVs, but were horrified to learn that he was a liberal, condemned many types of hunting, and would probably even be considered an ecoradical by some. I was quite leery of reading the sections on hunting and fishing, (as well as a piece on Thoreau which turned out to be positive), but they were less offensive than I feared, in part because I did skim through most of the lengthy ocean fishing descriptions.

I’m not sure Harrison and I would have liked each other in person, but I do enjoy his writing which I think can appeal to variety of open-minded people, and I recommend this collection. Occasionally there is a little repetition or conflict between articles, or information which is a little dated, but I didn’t consider any of it a major problem.

Thanks to Grove Press and NetGalley for an advance copy to review.

The Search for the Genuine: Nonfiction, 1970-2015by J. Harrison, published by Grove Atlantic Press.

Blurb:
The first general nonfiction title in thirty years from a giant of American letters, The Search for the Genuine is a sparkling, definitive collection of Jim Harrison's essays and journalism--some never before published

New York Times bestselling author Jim Harrison (1937-2016) was a writer with a poet's economy of style and trencherman's appetites and ribald humor.

In The Search for the Genuine, a collection of new and previously published essays, the giant of letters muses on everything from grouse hunting fishing to Zen Buddhism and matters of the spirit, including reported pieces on Yellowstone and shark-tagging in the open ocean, commentary on writers from Bukowski to Neruda to Peter Matthiessen, and a heartbreaking essay on life.
I never read this author and I thought why not, give it a try.
It took me a minute to get into the author's writing - it's unique. But the I was in for a treat. I loved the essays, artikles te al. 4,5 stars.

The first general nonfiction title in thirty years from a giant of American letters, The Search for the Genuine is a sparkling, definitive collection of Jim Harrison's essays and journalism—some never before published. This book has a lot of promise and Im sure it will find an audience. Something didnt connect with me and I am having hard time pinpointing what it wast.

Jim Harrison has a voice that embraces readers. The Search for Genuine is a book I'll be ordering in print so it can live on my nightstand, close by, for those nights I need to immerse myself in good stories so beautifully written in pitch perfect phrasing, tone, and intent. Hundreds of Gold Stars! ❤