Outside in Shorts: Seasons of Life, Luck, and Loss in the Outdoors

by Allen C Crater

As outdoorsmen, it’s natural to measure time in seasons, each made up of immeasurable small moments. A handful of these experiences live on to become the fabric of tradition – mementos of victories and vestiges of failures that pay homage to pleasures and pains, fears and frustrations, trials and triumphs. Common bonds. We taste them in a cup of coffee poured before a winter trek in the big woods, and smell them in those first, fresh days of spring. We hear them in the soft chuckle of a summer river and see them in the silent sip of trout and the staunch point of a seasoned dog. We wear them like a trusty old flannel beside a campfire, where they become tall tales, or even legends, and celebrate our common bond with wild places and with each other.

Outside in Shorts – Seasons of Life, Luck and Loss in the Outdoors is a collection of 29 short stories that explore a catalog of seasons passed among woods and water – four decades of treasured mementos. Memories of people and places, of piscatorial pursuits and perplexing predicaments, of puppies and parenting and pink cake, and the profound pleasure of a life spent outdoors.

Paperback

Published September 19, 2022

Reviews

[London Baker · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a really touching, beautifully written collection of short stories about nature and the wonders it holds. Some stories were better than others, some made me laugh and a few even brought tears to my eyes.

Allen has proven himself as an author and I hope to see more from him somewhere down the line.