Books like Dr. Beach's Survival Guide — picked by fans

This book covers the full range of accidents that could occur and how to recognize and prevent them from ruining a family vacation. The greatest risk at surf beaches is rip currents, causing 100 drownings annually, with more than 60,000 rescues by lifeguards in the United States. 

At some beaches where powerful waves break right at the shore, shorebreaks can pick you up and crash you headfirst into shallow water, resulting in concussions, serious neck and spinal injuries. Snorkeling seems to be as easy as putting on a mask, but it is the largest cause of drowning in Hawaii, so one should practice in a shallow swimming pool before venturing into the ocean. Scuba diving and surfing are exhilarating sports, but they come with a range of serious dangers that must be understood which requires professional training.

This book provides color illustrations and photographs to help you better understand these… show more.

This book provides an appealing overview of waves and currents with a folksy tone and scientific perspective. This book provides a quick and easy-to-understand guide to the top five physical beach hazards:  rip currents, dumping waves (shorebreaks), shallow water diving, surging waves and big, storm-generated waves.

Rob has dedicated his life to making Australian beaches safer, including giving talks on the “Science of the Surf” to thousands of schoolchildren. Beaches are fun but dangerous places under certain conditions, and this book is for everyone who loves the surf.    

This book describes the myriad of hazards possibly impacting blue-water sailors and casual beachcombers. Using real-life examples, Gary explains the natural processes, events, and creatures, why and where they may occur, and what should or shouldn’t concern us to provide a clearer understanding of how oceans behave. 

My greatest fear is being caught in a landfalling tsunami; I stayed at a little village near sea level on one of the Phi Phi Islands in Thailand that was destroyed by the Great Indian Ocean Tsunami of 2004—timing is everything in life, or hopefully, I would have followed the elephants who headed to high ground before these huge waves came ashore.

Gary’s book covers this great calamity but also explains the more common occurrences and hazards of rip currents, rogue waves, and hurricanes.   

This book is an update of Bascom’s bestselling classic that was first published in 1963 and updated in 1979. I had the pleasure of learning about Bill Bascom by reading the papers presented at a symposium in his honor at the University of California, Berkeley, just a few years before his untimely death. 

Bascom was one of few people to use a DUKW boat to surf the big breakers at the Columbia River offshore shoals where the US Coast Guard cutters are intentionally rolled over in 20-30-foot breaking waves as a training exercise for new recruits (and to weed out those of faint of heart).  His buddy Kim McCoy, who is an oceanographer, sailor, and freediver, has brought this book back to life with updates regarding climatic impacts on coasts and beaches.  

While surfers and sailors will immerse themselves in this book, it vividly describes the struggle for supremacy between… show more.

I love this book because, on almost every page, I learned something new about the Southern California beaches I enjoy so much—everything from why the beaches physically exist to why the public has access to them. This book digs deep to explore how minority and marginalized populations struggled for beach access during the twentieth century. In doing so, it tells us a lot about how beach culture as we know it emerged in Southern California.

I also appreciate its ending on a cautionary note, explaining how sea levels rising because of unrelenting fossil-fuel combustion threaten to literally wipe out the beaches that millions of us enjoy each year.

I love a good memoir, and this one was a perfect example of the form. Thoughtful, funny, incredibly well-written, and structured, I cared deeply about Lori and her patients. As she weaves together stories from her training as a therapist, her patients, and her work with her own therapist, we see how incredibly damaging life and love are for us—and how those scars themselves make us more beautiful, more worthy of love, more capable of opening our hearts to others.

This does not make the human experience look easy or painless, but it does help me remember what the work is for and how beautiful the pathway can be when we have good company on the way. This book was excellent company for me.

Dr. Harris is a world-changer. In her pediatric practice in an at-risk neighborhood in San Francisco, she saw young patients suffering challenges and illnesses that did not appear to be linked to any physical condition. She dug deeper, and discovered Adverse Childhood Experiences and the deep impact they can have on young lives. It is now her mission to educate doctors, who have not typically been trained in trauma or social and emotional challenges. Her book (and her TEDtalk on the same topic) is fascinating, exacting, and hopeful. Nadine Burke-Harris is now the first-ever Surgeon General of the State of California, and continues to educate parents and professionals about trauma and healing.

I devoured Eben Alexander’s book about a neurologist’s experiences in a coma. It was fascinating, the kind of book that keeps you glued to your seat. A few years ago, I wouldn’t have even considered reading a book with that title. My rational mind wasn’t open to anything beyond what my senses could verify. I dismissed my mystical experiences as coincidences, skeptical of anything that challenged the laws of physics or hinted at mystery.

Though the word "heaven" still doesn’t resonate with me, I’ve begun to sense something unknown. William Blake said, "Everything possible to be believed is an image of truth." My growing awareness of my own mortality has made me more receptive to the unknown.

I no longer demand proof or argue with the unseen. Instead, I listen and allow wonder to rise naturally. Death, once seen as an end, now feels like a threshold into something vast… show more.

Before reading this book, I thought the most inclusive version of the slow travel principle of micro-travel and mindfulness was going outside and experiencing the weather. But because of a mysterious illness that left her bedridden, Bailey could not go outside nor look out the window. Yet, she wrote about the habits and hijinks of a tiny snail a friend brought her in a pot of violets.

I loved that Bailey found snail “bites” on paper and then explained how a snail’s mouth works and why the hole in the paper was square-shaped. The snail becomes Bailey’s connection to the outdoors (or wildness), where she finds hope and agency. My lesson: a terrarium can be as (or more) therapeutic to someone’s spirit as walking Spain’s Camino de Santiago.

My god, a book about keeping chickens and chicken heath that's actually based on science and experience! (Sorry, there are sooooo many terrible blogs and books and posts out there by people who care just cutting and pasting from other crappy blogs and books.) This is the very best source for everything health-wise on chickens. Check here for the real scoop on adding vinegar to chicken water (why and at what dose), what's up with garlic (neutralize the order of chicken poop, and I promise it won’t flavor your eggs), diatomaceous earth, and thousands of other chicken topics and ailments. As a new chicken keeper, I felt a lot safer keeping my backyard chickens healthy, and diagnosing their issues, with this book on my shelf.