NETS OVERBOARD!

Last year Jack Coggins did the best single book around on signals. This year he hauls in another net full of masculine interest. Even those boys who can't stand the smell of fish frying respond to the elemental, primitive aura that surrounds commercial fishing in spite of all the labor saving devices now employed on the ships. From the exotic Japanese cormorant fishing bird flocks and the native sponge and pearl divers to the special winch/net machines on radar equipped boats, Coggins seems to have missed nothing in between and nothing that has come before. For instance, he covers whaling from the hand-cast harpoon days to the huge floating factories of today; the net mazes are taken from the time of smart Indian hands to the oversize imitations now under industry direction. His illustrations are clear expansions of the text which includes current laws and figures on the money catches. As good as anything adult readers have swimming around.