Barbarian Days

Memoir is a genre rife with pitfalls. Finnegan does more than dance around them; he provides a shining example of memoir at its best. Surfing is the focus, of course, but the sport provides a clarifying lens through which Finnegan explores much else: masculinity, aging, class, love, injustice, nature, obsession. I laughed out loud at the end of this book. It felt as if your smartest, most interesting friend just told you his life story and then went, 'Anyway, the point is that I'm stoked to go surf tomorrow!'