It’s Only Drowning: A True Story of Learning To Surf and the Search for Common Ground

Litt (Democracy in One Book or Less) once worked as President Obama’s speech writer, a job that included composing the script for several White House Correspondents’ Association dinners. The skills Litt honed by speech writing—especially being quick, clever, and funny while imbuing meaning—are on full display here. Though this book is nominally about learning to surf, at the heart of the tale is Litt’s learning to see beyond his assumptions. Litt’s brother-in-law Matt provides the foil, and the two could not be more different. Driven into despair by the pandemic and the political landscape, Litt decides to learn to surf. Matt is already a surfer, and that one connection haltingly fuels more closeness as the two travel to surf spots and ultimately face the overhead waves of Hawai‘i. Along the way are details of surfing and scenes rife with amity, quarrelsomeness, and bewilderment—but always, Litt and Matt strive for something that looks like neutral ground.