PRAISE FOR HAVE RACQUET, WILL TRAVEL
Bill Emrich was a very good tennis player, and he certainly expresses his love of the game in this book. Bill also captures the character of his military service in Vietnam and his stay in Venezuela, both with and without his tennis racquet. As most authors want to be, Bill qualifies as a great storyteller. —Bob Eastright, past president,Shore and Country Club, Norwalk, Connecticut
Have Racquet, Will Travel provides a fresh and personal narration of the odyssey of a young man from student life in New England to soldiering in early ‘70s Vietnam to an interlude as tennis and English instructor in oil-booming and progressive Venezuela in the early ‘80s. Things have surely changed since those days, and Bill captures the essence with the skill of a fine story-teller. —Raul Valle, Boston-educated engineer and Venezuelan HR executive, Caracas
PRAISE FOR WILD MAINE ADVENTURE
William Emrich’s passion inspired his book, Wild Maine Adventure. With joy and amazement, he tells of realizing the dream of owning a camp on a Maine pond. His love of fishing, living off the grid, and viewing Maine’s wildlife in its natural habitat shines out. This is a book about Maine but even more about the rewards of having determination and pursuing a dream.
—Judith Burger-Gossart, Maine author, Sadie’s Winter Dream, Fishermen’s Wives, and Maine Sea Coast Mission Hooked Rugs
Bill Emrich has done something so special. He has spent a lifetime seeking and fulfilling his dream, despite setbacks, challenges, and adventures. With love and enthusiasm, Bill shows us the fulfillment we might find in going the distance. As a Mainer and lover of camps, I read his story and kind words of my state with a smile all the way through.
—Kimberley Collins Kalicky, author and blogger, Away at a Camp in Maine and LivingMaineSeasons.com
William Emrich takes us on this Wild Maine Adventure as open and casually as if relating his story to a new friend. The cabin adventure is almost a century from Thoreau’s, but even without epigraphs, the comparison could not be avoided. Negative events are more than balanced by the fishing, the woods, the view, and the economic shopping at barn and yard sales for furnishings. Extensive illustrations of birds, fish, and animals give the book a value beyond the text.”
—Robert M. Chute, professor emeritus, Bates College, Lewiston, Maine
If you have ever wanted to experience the serenity of a cabin in the peaceful, alive beauty of Maine but haven’t done it yet, Wild Maine Adventure is the next best thing to being there. William Emrich’s book calms the soul like the crystal waters he describes, and his pictorial journal delivers the wild natural world he loves. Wild Maine Adventure will please your eye, transport your mind, and heal your spirit.
—Bette Freedson, LCSW, LICSW, author, Soul Mothers’ Wisdom: Seven Insights for the Single Mother
Get ready to immerse in a delightful vicarious romp through a man’s dream coming to fulfillment. With the glee of a boy anticipating a long-desired birthday gift, the author recounts his trials, tribulations, thrills, and joys in seeing his very own pond-side Maine cabin manifest and in his subsequent immersion in the surrounding natural wonders.
—Donna Minnis, PhD, executive director, Pemaquid Watershed Association • www.pemaquidwatershed.org
We all long for a passion in life; some of us are lucky enough to find it. For William Emrich, his discovery of the Maine wilderness compelled him against all odds to make his dream a reality. His determination to get there propelled him through various absurdities of human bureaucracy and tradition until at last he could enjoy the more entertaining—if equally mysterious—antics of his new neighbors, the wild animals who also called this beautiful lakeshore home.
—Kelly Payson-Roopchand, author, Birth, Death and a Tractor
William Emrich’s Wild Maine Adventure is a back-to-the-land narrative written by a member of that generation who had a later start. His story, told in a matter-of-fact style, is reminiscent of coming to live on the land in Maine in the 1970s. The photos of a house going up are familiar and show wilderness beginning to conform to a human life. Though he was frustrated at all the details, he was happy to be on his adventure at last. He observes closely the animal encounters he has, which shows how little things, when seen so consciously, can add up to a life-changing experience.
—Linda Tatelbaum, author, Carrying Water as a Way of Life
A cabin up north, a cabin in Maine. Familiar dream? Telling his story good-naturedly, celebrating each step forward, William Emrich writes like a kindly uncle. Whether sleuthing out waterfront land, out-witting bold chipmunks, listening to loons, or negotiating a self-service firewood stand, he shares contagious joy.
—Kathy Scott, author, Brook Trout Forest
How long does it take to create a getaway, a sanctuary, in Mid Coast Maine—including a rustic cabin in the woods on a scenic pond? In William Emrich’s case, somewhere around eighteen years. Wild Maine Adventure is an inspiring tale of how vision, perseverance, good humor, and improvisation can bring about the realization of one’s dreams.”
—Tim Baehr, publisher, Stone Bear Publications
Who hasn’t dreamed of wildlife and the slow life on a small pond in Maine? William Emrich certainly has. Part love story, part how-to manual for those looking for their own piece of the dream (a house on water, water anywhere), his Wild Maine Adventure tells a classic American story, and in it we get to watch as his dream comes to life before our eyes.
—Jeffrey Thomson, author, Birdwatching in Wartime and fragile