Tilbury House
Softcover
Pages: 128
Size: 5.5” x 8”
Published: March 2004
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Finalist for the 2006 Maine Literary Award

In a trio of wonderful, long essays, three quite different writers—one a nature and outdoor writer, another a poet, and the third an essayist and novelist—let us sit in on their friendship and what draws them, inexorably, to the same small pond in Maine. Bob Kimber, living in a farmhouse near the pond, buys a dilapidated camp at the water's edge and finds his way down there almost daily, to swim or ski, depending on the season. His friends discover the allure of the pond, too—summer afternoons of swimming with Bob, his wife Rita, and an assortment of canine dog-paddlers, or companionable conversations over a beer, enjoying the beauty of a quiet pond beyond the porch. Bob tells Wesley McNair about a neighboring camp up for sale, a perfect little camp, compact as a ship in all its details, and they buy it. Bill Roorbach feels drawn to the pond so strongly that he and his wife sometimes bushwack through underbrush so as not to intrude, but the pond is a place where this trio of friendships flourishes. Told with humor and affection, the stories in this small book will appeal to anyone who feels drawn to spend time near water.

Critical Praise

“…provides a vision of what could be in the world beyond the pond..."
—Down East

"...to be read when the bugs aren't too bad and you can doze off in the hammock..."
—Bangor Daily News

"These back-to-the-ponders weave a vision of an inland heaven, one we should all be so lucky to experience."
—The Bar Harbor Times

Advance Praise

“These three writers have combined their extended essays to make a book for the like-minded—meditative skinny-dippers, pond lovers, bird-watchers, and inspectors, to paraphrase Thoreau, of trees and snowstorms.”
—Maxine Kumin, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Up Country