Red County, California

No better time of year than the 4th of July to sharpen your surfing skillz.

Along with a well-waxed board, waterproof sunblock and a cool set of trunks (for the guys) or two-piece (for the gals), you might want to pack a copy of Elliott Almond’s book, Surfing: Mastering Waves from Basic to Intermediate (Mountaineers Outdoor Expert), for ready reference and keep your beach towel from blowing away.

Matt Coker at OC Weekly interviewed Almond about the book:

OC Weekly: What gave you the idea to include all the “non-instruction” information, and how on earth did you pack everything into 200 pages?

Elliott Almond: When Mountaineers came to me with the idea, they sent samples of other books in the Mountaineers Outdoor Expert Series collection that had a few sidebars. That’s where I saw the potential to be much more expansive. As I started my research, it became clear that basic surf instruction can be found in cyberspace. As a result, I wanted to make this book something more than what a reader could find on the Internet.

I treated the project as a journalist more than an instructor who writes for niche publications. In other words, I tried to write sidebars that would enhance the chapters, such as the profiles on a surfboard shaper and wetsuit pioneer in the section on gear. Also, surfing is just so fascinating; the more I learned from my interviews and research, the more I wanted to share it with my readers. It’s one thing to offer instruction on how to wax a board, but it seemed to be much more interesting to also explain the history of surfboard wax.

Surfing is different from skiing, snowboarding, biking and other recreational endeavors. The culture and history are integrated into the activity. If you decide to become a surfer, you need to navigate the culture as much as paddling into the lineup.

As for writing tightly, well, that comes from working in the ever-shrinking world of news print. As my industry is dying, we’re forced to write economically.

Click through for the full story.

(Hat tip: Seal Beach Daily.)