Calmly on the Waters

Calmly on the Waters (Bauhan Publishing | June 2026 | $22.00 trade paper, illustrated) is Jarvis Coffin’s first collected volume of essays. For more than a decade, as co-owner with his wife of New Hampshire’s oldest inn, The Hancock Inn (now, The Inn at Hancock), Coffin offered a steady sense of place in conversations with travelers from around the world, and in popular, monthly pieces sent to the inn’s guest list.

In this collection he gathers a selection of essays rooted in life beside a pond in the woods of southern New Hampshire. Quiet, attentive, and occasionally humorous, these essays invite readers to slow down and observe a world reachable “on two feet, or by canoe, or by car, with no more than a tank of gas.” Written against the backdrop of deep winters, uncertain springs, brief summers, and colorful autumns, Calmly on the Waters is organized by season, following the rhythms that shape daily life in rural New England.

Sy Montgomery, author of The Good Good Pig, wrote:

As the town’s innkeeper, Jarvis Coffin perfected the art of hospitality—and here in these pages, he welcomes readers to our our town. Hancock, New Hampshire, abounds with fall foliage, snow, ice, mud, black flies, ticks, spring birdsong, summer fireflies, ponds, woods, and quirky human and animal neighbors. His acutely observed essays—sometimes funny, sometimes surprising, always delightful—give you a feel for the place I love most in this sweet green world. 

Mel Allen, author of Here in New England, said:

As both features editor and then editor-in-chief of Yankee magazine, I had the pleasure of editing Edie Clark’s essays of her life at her rural New Hampshire home.  Her “Mary’s Farm” column became beloved by tens of thousands.  When I read Jarvis Coffin’s Calmly on the Waters, his collection of essays from his own rural New Hampshire Eden, I know the pages will also resonate with anyone who believes that close observation of the natural world can be a balm for the soul in our turbulent times.  What makes Coffin’s essays so readable is his light humor and gentle touch.  “I am awed by life’s persistence, which even in the smallest of creatures always appears greater than mine, carrying knowledge as deep or deeper,” he writes. The reader will want to join Coffin and share in his awe as the New England seasons come and go.  This is a book to connect with all of us, wherever we live.

Calmly on the Waters is available at many New England bookstores, on Amazon, and from here, directly, using the purchase link above. Books ordered directly benefit from free shipping and can be signed, per a buyer's request.

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