The most recommended surfing books

A big part of lifelong learning involves experimenting, trying new things, and picking up new skills. I must confess this can be challenging for me; I’m one of those people who sometimes gets frustrated or embarrassed when I try something new and find it doesn’t come easily to me. Maybe you’re the same way--if so, all the more reason to take inspiration from Vanderbilt’s book, which chronicles his efforts to learn how to play chess, surf, sing, juggle, and more. Woven in with those entertaining experiences are larger lessons about how we learn, and why it’s so beneficial to keep doing so. In the hands of a less skilled writer, a book like this--in which a journalist tries on a series of new hats--might seem gimmicky. But Vanderbilt is an insightful observer and storyteller who can even make traffic fascinating (that was the subject of a previous book of his,… show more.

The surfing safari was immortalized in 1962 by the Beach Boys, and made legendary by Bruce Brown’s iconic 1966 film, Endless Summer. The search for great surf is a pillar of this literary genre. Whether harrowing, aggrandizing, escapist, or prize-winning, surf memoirs have a common theme: a quest. An empty beach, an epic swell, a perfect wave, an adventure, an escape. Surfers are always looking to the horizon—searching. What speaks to me in Yogis’s memoir is his explicit connection between the struggle toward Buddhist enlightenment and the teachings of the ocean, its waves, and surfing. With self-effacing humor and a conversational style, Jaimal Yogis, makes the worlds of both Zen Buddhism and surfing, approachable and human. Yogis, quoting Walt Whitman, reminds us: “Who need be afraid of the merge?” 

The Dawn Patrol is the first in Winslow’s Boone Daniels detective series. It has many hallmarks of a Winslow novel: a Southern California backdrop (San Diego), a host of morally ambiguous characters, a generally good guy trying to do what’s right, snappy writing, and surfing. This book also presents a surf culture we’ve come to recognize from television and movies, with a language, that while not universally shared by all surfers, is understood as the sport’s lingua franca—dude, gnarly, epic, wipeout. Where this book excels, however, is in capturing surfing’s dualistic nature as both a solitary pursuit and a place of a tight-knit community. Main character Boone Daniels is both the lone wolf and a member of a pack, one that can both have his back in the lineup and turn on him on dry land.

This novel started it all, creating the character of Gidget who would ultimately appear in three feature films, two TV series, three made-for-TV movies, four more novels, and two novelizations of movies, plus kid cartoons, parodies, songs, and more. Gidget: The Little Girl with Big Ideas is based on the real-life experiences of screenwriter Kohner’s daughter Kathy, who found herself one of very few girls surfing in Malibu. The story is told in the voice of Gidget, nicknamed that because she is a diminutive girl. To be sure, the novel deals with her crush on Jeff, nicknamed Moondoggie, and her burgeoning sexual desire, but the novel does more than titillate. More importantly, the novel emphasizes Gidget’s passion for surfing, and especially the feeling of freedom that surfing provides. In the end, Gidget says her romance with Jeff may have been “a dream” but her romance with surfing is “for real:”… show more.

This is an adventure! Turn the pages of this book to find waves and many kinds of waves: rogue, freak, and giant waves of the ocean and the people who try to surf them. I am a retired US Coast Guard officer and sailed many ships at sea. As a mariner we know of or have seen waves, some of them tossing our ships in the middle of the night as we try to sail home. Any number of ships have vanished in the ocean, quickly, with no time to put out an SOS call for help. This is a great book to learn more while having an adventure reading it from the safety of your chair.

I have kept track of my own dreams since the age of sixteen, writing them down each morning, and often illustrating them too. But Tina Tau has done far more. Her life has been, quite literally, guided by dreams.

Ask for Horses could be called a double memoir, a conversation between the worlds, visible and invisible. The writing is lucid and engaging, the plot (such as it is) both lively and unpredictable. Tina Tau herself emerges an unlikely heroine: generous, warmhearted, and intrepid. 

Arguably, this is not a book about surfing. The Silence of the Wave is about an Italian undercover police officer dealing with trauma and guilt. But within this hardboiled story of crisis and the dark and ugly undercurrents of our modern world, Carofiglio beautifully illustrates the lasting impact surfing can have on a person’s life. Like first love, surfing may be in your past, but it is never forgotten and often takes on a mythic quality that at once can feel like a dream and also lead you back to your true self.

I discovered this book when I had just started surfing, and it blew me away – so there could be great fiction about extreme sports! I loved the grittiness, the foreboding noir feel, and the unusual setting. It was part of the inspiration for Powder Burn, although they are very different books.

I was only 10% into this book when I had to pause and catch my breath—so much had happened already!

I was sucked straight in and sent on a roller coaster ride as the action ripped through the pages, pushing the characters into precarious situations and edge-of-your-seat cliffhangers. All this while surfing advanced technology like nano-bots and computer brain interfaces, in a speculative fiction whirlwind, complete with secret societies, betrayal, subterfuge, mystery, and many points of no return.

Manney’s writing is vivid, strong and doesn’t pull any punches. When I put the book down, I had to take a deep breath and go for a walk, with my mind expanded, and my heart racing. A triumph! Hugely enjoyable.

Building your own sailboat from scratch, then sailing it from California down to Baja, camping, and surfing along the way: how can that not be a cool story? Christian Beamish manages the perfect blend of introspection and backstory with descriptions of sea, sky, land, and the people he meets along the way.

T.W. Neal grows up with parents who opt to live on a sparsely populated Hawaiian island, not wearing clothes, surfing, smoking Marijuana, and eating magic mushrooms. The family lives in a van or in housing with few modern amenities and the author attends school on the island only sporadically. Due to her mother’s mental illness and her father’s alcohol abuse, she at times, has to run the household. With difficulty she connects with relatives and a few teachers and begins to reach for a lifeline to break free from the life her parents chose. She wants to go to college and eventually is able to leave the island and pursue a mainstream life. It is astounding that a person growing up in such circumstances would have the desire and determination to forge a different life.

Samira is a Rohingya girl whose family fled anti-Muslim violence in Myanmar and now lives near a refugee camp in a Bangladesh beach town. This doesn’t sound like the set-up for a “sports” book, yet like all the best sports books, this beautiful novel-in-verse is about so much more than simply winning or losing a game. I love the way Guidroz shows the strong bonds that form within a team – in this case, a group of girls who help one another learn to swim and surf, defying cultural standards that bar girls from these activities. I also love how participating in this sport gives Samira a way to grow as an individual and claim her own identity: “Before I was Samira,” she says. “Now, I am Samira the Surfer.”

This has to be the coolest story of reinvention – man gets unexpectedly dumped by his wife, moves to a California beach town, rescues a 140-lb neglected Newfoundland, and teaches him how to surf with him on his longboard. Man and dog are both traumatized, and the scenes of their slow dance around one another in a tiny apartment are so sweet and awkward, like the slapstick 80’s sitcoms I grew up watching. I love stories like this that make me believe in fate, that Colin and his dog George were destined to give each other a second chance. When they start winning dog surf competitions, I was cheering out loud. It’s quirky, brilliant, and badass all wrapped in one. 

Retired hitman Frankie Machianno thinks he’s left the past behind and can focus on the things that matter—wife, mistress, daughter, surfing, perfect kitchen, roasting coffee, cooking.

But someone is coming for him and wants him dead. The problem is: Frankie doesn’t know who. As he tries to figure it out, we learn about Frank, his family, his lover, and his past, from San Diego beach bum to mafia “button man.”

He’s my favorite kind of gangster—the good guy bad guy—and I couldn’t help but like Frank and fear for his life, as the novel hurtles toward its bittersweet conclusion.



Peter Pan has always been a bit of a dark story, I remember as a child being quite concerned about how easy it was to kill Tinkerbell and why Peter needed his shadow stitched back on! Second Star is a modern but dark retelling of this children’s fable, set in sunny California and amongst the surfing community, we follow a 17-year-old Wendy as she searches for her missing brothers. Stepping into a dark world, she finds herself drawn to the Cove’s enigmatic leader Pete but she is also pulled towards his dangerous and drug-dealing nemesis, Jas. This novel shows how a classic can be used as inspiration but the author is still able to make the story their own and I always enjoy reading that.

To look at what is written about surfing, it would seem that it’s a “man’s world.” Surfing, like other pursuits and professions, is one where women are often characterized as either anecdotal or exceptional. The truth is so much richer and complex that, as a woman who surfs, I almost don’t want to share our secrets. But Easkey Britton shares some of hers from years of competitive surfing around the world and from the fierce and sustaining waters she calls home on the west coast of Ireland. Britton has surfed waves and conditions that few among us have the desire to tackle. But in discussing all these places and all these conditions, she speaks eloquently about what can be gained through immersion in the ocean that gave birth to our human form and continues to abide by our human trespasses. 

Maud is a riot – she’s not had the easiest of lives and she is determined to enjoy her later years. If anyone gets in her way or does something to upset her, she has no hesitation in bumping them off – whether on the spur of the moment or with detailed planning. Like me, she loves to travel, and she is a dab hand with the internet. Unlike most crime books, her story is told in short stories rather than as a novel, each perfectly formed, unexpected, and guaranteed to bring a smile to your face. 

It's one of the most unique romances I've read. A virgin and an fboy meet, and we hate him instantly. And yet, I couldn't wait to watch him grow and show his softer side.

The characters sparkled—the main couple and the friends and family. No one was left out. They were all real and imperfect and engaging.

As the couple gets closer, the book gets steamy. Then it becomes the perfect blend of romance and hot with a spin that just isn't out there. I don't read physical books anymore, but I'm glad I did for this one.

I loved the book because the author’s love for the sport comes across so plainly. The stories from the spiritual home of surfing, Oahu’s North Shore, are wonderful. It’s an essential text for anyone getting into the sport, capturing its soul better than anything else I have read.

Captain Liz Clark is who I would have wanted to be when I grew up, had I found her story in my teens.

There were almost no strong female role models that I could point to as a girl who inspired me, and illuminated a path of an adventurous woman. Captain Liz Clark built her own sailboat and decided to take on the entire Pacific Ocean on her adventures to find love, connection, and a relationship to nature and her own pure heart.

I clutched this book to my heart and took it with me everywhere for a month. Then I wrote Captain Liz to option it, so we can make a TV show about her life, because we need her story on screen!