The title of Two-Thirds Water beautifully refers to how fish-filled waters cover two-thirds of our planet as Arnie offers an introspective reflection into his lifetime experiences related to fishing. The entries weave together the broad and varied stories of his adventures as his love of fishing was sparked as a young kid. The love of fly-fishing came later in life while he was attending graduate school at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst where he spent a lot of time exploring and fishing the Berkshire trout stream.

 

Arnie began his professional career as a teacher and writer in the educational field with posts at The University of Maine, Kalamazoo College in Michigan, and Yale University. He joined Hamden Hall in 2012 as an Upper School teacher in the English Department. Arnie spent a decade under the pines before departing in 2022 to dedicate his time to writing and making it a central part of his life. He began publishing written content about his particular areas of interest on Substack, an online platform for independent writers. Arnie said that platform gave him the opportunity to be consistent with his work and write professionally for real audiences. Outside of writing, Arnie started a podcast titled Hemingway Word for Word. Each recorded episode details and provides analysis of Hemingway’s stories and novels.

 

“Being a writer and creative is essential to who I am as a person,” said Arnie. “I have an MFA degree in fiction writing, and it’s always been important for me to devote a significant amount of time on my writing even when teaching at Hamden Hall and other colleges and universities.”

 

With the new allotted time, he began the process of developing Two-Thirds Water and said he spent long days revising and expanding the book. Once the draft was completed and satisfactory to Arnie, he sent it to small and medium-sized presses, a few large commercial publishers, and literary agents for consideration. As time passed, he sent it to an independent publishing company called Skyhorse Press and connected with the head of the company, Tony Lyons. Arnie said he knew Tony as he was the son of renowned fly-fishing writer Nick Lyons. It was successful as two of the essays from the collection were published in The Seasonable Angler column for Fly Fisherman magazine. The partnership grew as Tony passed the book along to his father, who enjoyed it. He recommended Arnie to send it to his former company, Lyon’s Press, now Globe Pequot. The book was officially published in February and is available on the company site and other retailers.

 

Following the official publication, Arnie began organizing reading events with a recent stop at RJ Julia Booksellers in Madison. While writing is in the forefront, his teaching career is not far behind as he works part-time at The Educational Center for the Arts in New Haven. He works two days a week with high school students on their creative writing endeavors and spends the extra time devoted to his own writing.