I was born in our old farmhouse three miles north of Sandpoint, Idaho, August 25, 1933. Our little farm raised mostly stumps and a few weeds but otherwise didn't amount to much, except it was a wonderful place for a boy to grow up. The farm was located in a valley between two ranges of the Rocky Mountains, the Selkirks and the Cabinets. Sandpoint was located on the shores of spectacular Lake Pend Oreille, at that time one of the great fishing lakes in the country.

By the time I was ten, my friends and I were already backpacking, usually up Schweitzer Creek, which tumbled down out of the mountains a couple of miles from our homes. The creek was tiny but the adventures large, with every dark night filled with imagined terrors. Never have I been so glad to be greeted by first light of morning than on those first trips up Schweitzer. I know now that those early outings were not only wonderful adventures but great training for life ahead, particularly in learning to control fear of the unknown. They have also provided me with a great deal of material for my writing.

My mother was a country schoolteacher, usually teaching all eight grades in little one-room schools tucked away in remote mountain valleys. These were primitive places. The school at Squaw Valley was a one-room log cabin heated by an old barrel stove and lit by kerosene lanterns. Not only did Mom teach all eight grades there, she chopped the firewood, hauled the drinking water from the creek, shoveled the snow out of the path to the privy, handled all the janitorial duties, cooked and served hot lunches, put on school plays and assorted parties for the pupils, and, on weekends, arranged card parties and dances for the adults of the community. Oh, and to some extent, looked after my sister, Patricia, and to an even lesser extent, me. Even though I was supposed to be one of Mom's pupils in first and then second grade, I was pretty much allowed to come and go as I pleased. Indeed, I spent much more time messing about in the creek and in the surrounding woods than I ever did in school. I thought my mother and I were in perfect agreement on this arrangement, until I received my final report card at the end of second grade. My own mother had flunked me! The reason given: Too many absences! Mom explained later that her actual reason for flunking me was that she thought I was too immature for second grade. A likely story.

After my father died, when I was six, we moved back to our farm and Mom taught math at the junior high school in Sandpoint. My sister was very smart even skipped entire grades. I, on the other hand, distinguished myself as a student of unwavering mediocrity. Looking back, I don't know why I didn't apply myself in school, since I had to be there anyway. Although I put forth an absolute minimum of effort in school, I was not without ambition. From the age of six, I intended to be an artist, and I drew and painted constantly, turning out hundreds and probably thousands of drawings and paintings over my school years. Although I never became an artist, I think all the effort I poured into drawing and painting helped me a greatly as a writer. There isn't too much difference between painting with paints and painting with words, except the latter is a lot less messy.

While still in high school, I started working summers on the dams that were being built on the Clark Fork River. I drove trucks, serviced heavy equipment, assisted drillers, ran a jack hammer, and one year worked as a highscaler, a job which consisted of dangling from a rope over a steep cliff and clearing away loose rock. I loved it. Then one of the other highscalers got killed when rock fell on him, and I decided I didn't love highscaling anymore. I started thinking very seriously about going to college.

I saved enough money from construction work to get me through my freshman years at Washington State College (now Washington State University). Because my academic career so far had been distinguished only by its unrelenting mediocrity, I feared I might not be smart enough to survive in college. My Freshman English Comp teacher, I'm sure, shared my view. Every week we had to write a little essay for his class. My first half dozen essays came back with F's. Bit by bit, however, I became fascinated with writing and began to spend as much time on writing essays as I had once spent on drawing pictures. This diligence paid off with a major breakthrough: I received a D! Then came a C, a B, an A, several A's and finally, on my last essay, an A-plus! There was also a note from the professor that he had recommended me for honors English the next semester. I was on my way to becoming a writer.

The Huckleberry Murders

A Sheriff Bo Tully Mystery

Sherriff Tully's got a bucket-full of mysteries to solve in his latest escapade — he's 'bout certain that a local retiree has been done in by his sociopath caretaker — only thing he's missing is a body, or any other shred of evidence. Then, picking huckleberries for his mother, he finds himself up to his elbows in bodies — with no identification or explanation. Ruminating over the puzzle of the big, white dual-tire pickup, before he knows it Tully finds himself in a haunted swamp with a beautiful FBI agent, his Pap, an expert tracker, and mountain man Poke. It's going to take Tully's famous hunches and more to untangle the twists and turns of what's been called McManus' most entertaining mystery yet.

Hardcover Price: $25.00
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Kerplunk!

Patrick F. McManus's gently comic stories about outdoor life have earned him millions of fans worldwide. With Kerplunk!, McManus delivers a collection of folksy, wonderfully wise depictions of country life worthy of Mark Twain.

In these tall tales, McManus and his buddies learn how not to net a fish, why you should never get your hair cut by someone who's mad at you, what to do when a deer wanders into camp but your sleeping bag has frozen shut, and how to avoid bird-dog flatulence.

Traveling the highways and byways of the Pacific Northwest, the delightful backcountry characters of Kerplunk! understand how a life of hunting and fishing -- and its inherent potential for misadventure -- can resonate with larger meaning. McManus's characters know exactly why it costs $500 to make a fly lure that retails for $2; why installing a boat trailer hookup can lead to divorce; and, most important, why you should always listen for the sound of your fishing line hitting the water -- because in life as it is in fishing, you don't know you're in the water until you hear the kerplunk!

These wry, curmudgeonly tales appeal to real outdoorsmen and the armchair variety alike. Often nostalgic, occasionally philosophical, and always funny, the stories in Kerplunk! reaffirm Patrick F. McManus's reputation as an American classic.

Paperback Price $13.00
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Hardcover Price: $24.00
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The Blight Way

A Sheriff Bo Tully Mystery
The New York Times best selling author kicks off a rousing new mystery series set in the rarefied air of the Rockies-where maverick local sheriff Bo Tully has his hands full trying to ferret out a murderer among the colorful denizens of Blight County. Review the first chapter of Patrick F. McManus' new mystery novel as the sheriff of Blight County works his way through the twisted train of evidence to solve his first murder case.

Price: $14.00
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The Bear In The Attic

Patrick McManus' wry wit has made him an American classic, his trademark outdoorsman's humor endearing him not only to fellow wilderness enthusiasts, but to anyone who enjoys humor and can bear witness to the antics and anecdotes McManus recounts. In his newest collection of hilarious essays, he ponders the strange allure of the RV, a thirtieth-century hunting trip, the art of wrestling toads, the existential implications of being lost, the baffling tendency of animals to outsmart those who wish to hunt them, the singular pleasure of doubling the size of every fish one doesn't catch, and what happens when a bear named Pooky decides to hibernate in the attic.

Price: $12.00
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Never Cry "Arp!"

Never Cry "Arp!" is a lively collection of twelve stories about young Pat's misadventures in the Great American Wilderness. All the McManus regulars are here: Crazy Eddie Muldoon, the best friend everybody wishes they had (and everybody's mother wishes they didn't); Rancid Crabtree, the good-hearted, if gamey, woodsman; Pat's skunk dog, Strange, who lives up to his name; and Pat's pal, Retch Sweeney, who does, too. This is a book for kids who love to start fishing at 4 A.M. (at least they say they do) or for those who prefer to experience the mighty outdoors in the safety of their homes.

Price $17.95
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The Good Samaritan Strikes Again

In this, his eighth and funniest collection, we meet many of Pat McManus' personalities, most unknown to man or beast. The first is Pat the PR executive (his firm specializes in stretching a truth or two), whose chief responsibility is "to make two half-truths out of a whole truth." Pat gets so stressed out at work that his therapist persuades him to invent a fantasy farm to relieve the pressure. All is well until farming begins to take its toll-the dream-time chores are just too hard for Pat. Besides, PR pays well and there's no heavy lifting. Another Pat is a Good Samaritan who knows enough about emergencies to take his time getting to them ("who knows, this could allow some take-charge guy time to show up"). The legendary McManus voice is vigorous, providing laughter in the most unlikely places. Irresistible.

Price $14.00
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The Night The Bear Ate Goombaw

"What?" Eddie said. "Uh, you don't suppose your pa, uh, would let me go on the camping trip too, do you?" When Eddie put the question to his father, Mr. Muldoon tried to conceal his affection for me beneath a malevolent frown. "Oh, all right," he growled at me. "But no mischief. That means no knives, no hatchets, no matches, no slingshots, and no shovels! Understood?" I rushed home and asked my mother if I could go camping with the Muldoons. "You'd be away from home a whole week?" she said. "I'll have to think about that. Okay, you can go." I quickly packed my hatchet, knife, and slingshot, along with edibles Mom gave me to contribute to the Muldoon grub box.

Price $14.00
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The Grasshopper Trap

"You'd think there'd be an easier way to catch hoppers," I said. Crazy Eddie looked at me. "Say, I've got an idea!" "Forget it," I said. Already that summer I'd had too many narrow escapes as the result of Eddie's ideas. "But this is a great idea," he cried. "We can build a grasshopper trap!" Rancid dismissed the idea with a wave of his hand. "Wouldn't work. Ain't no way you could make a trap small enough to clamp on to a hopper's foot." "Not that kind of trap," Eddie said. He then went on to explain his idea to Rancid and me. It was dumb, probably the dumbest idea Eddie had ever had, and maybe even dangerous, if the completed contraption bore any resemblance to Crazy Eddie's other inventions. I was thankful that for once a mature adult was on hand to point out the risk and stupidity of such an idea. "Sounds good to me," Rancid said. "Let's go over to maw place and build it."

Price $14.00
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They Shoot Canoes, Don't They?

A while back my friend Retch Sweeney and I were hiking through a wilderness area and happened to come across these three guys who were pretending to cling to the side of a mountain as if their lives depended on it. They were dressed in funny little costumes and all tied together on a long rope. Their leader was pounding what looked like a big spike into a crack in the rock. We guessed right off what they were up to. They were obviously being initiated into a college fraternity, and this was part of the hazing. Not wishing to embarrass them any more than was absolutely necessary, Retch and I just let on as if everything was normal and if that scarcely a day went by that we didn't see people in funny costumes hammering nails into rock. "We seem to have taken a wrong turn back there a ways," I said to them. "Could you give us some idea where we are ?" The three pledgies seemed both angered and astonished at seeing us. "Why, this is the North Face of Mount Terrible," the leader said. "We're making an assault on it. You shouldn't be up here!" "You're telling me!" I said. "We're supposed to be on our way to Wild Rose Lake."

Price $13.00
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