Here are 100 books that The Dawn of Swimming fans have personally recommended if you like
The Dawn of Swimming.
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As a UK registered lawyer, I have spent most of the past 35 years writing about my work. But what has always excited me, from my childhood, is the science fiction worlds which state a truth which is yet to happen, The worlds of H.G Wells; Huxley; Aldous; Orwell; Bradbury; and Atwell. An individual's struggle against overwhelming odds. Not always somewhere where you would want to go. But from which you will always take something away.
What intrigues me about this book is the way the author, Margaret Atwood, took the (Genesis 30) story of Jacob, who impregnated his wife's handmaiden to produce the children which his wife could not conceive.
She then puts herself in the place of that handmaiden and asks some serious questions. Was that handmaid even given a choice in the matter? What would have happened to her if she had refused? She then rolls the same idea forward 4,000 years to a pseudo religious society in which the sole purpose of handmaidens is to use their bodies to conceive and gestate the next generation for those whom they serve.
** THE SUNDAY TIMES NO. 1 BESTSELLER ** **A BBC BETWEEN COVERS BIG JUBILEE READ**
Go back to where it all began with the dystopian novel behind the award-winning TV series.
'As relevant today as it was when Atwood wrote it' Guardian
I believe in the resistance as I believe there can be no light without shadow; or rather, no shadow unless there is also light.
Offred is a Handmaid in The Republic of Gilead, a religious totalitarian state in what was formerly known as the United States. She is placed in the household of The Commander, Fred Waterford -…
It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan.
The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced that it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to run…
After thirty years in corporate America, I retired to learn the craft of writing literary fiction—publishing my first novel at sixty-two. I write about characters faced with seemingly impossible situations whose choices ultimately reveal who they truly are. Through mindful self-awareness, I want readers to search within themselves to think about what they would do in a similar situation. These are five books that shaped my understanding of what literary fiction can do through deep characterization.
The heroine in this story struggles with cruel prejudices, rejection, heartbreak, and loneliness, leaving her unsure of who she can trust.
But she perseveres and becomes resilient to adversity, growing stronger with each situation. The personal truths she realizes in the process through self-discovery have the potential to provide universal wisdom for many of us.
OVER 12 MILLION COPIES SOLD WORLDWIDE NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE A NUMBER ONE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
For years, rumours of the 'Marsh Girl' have haunted Barkley Cove, a quiet town on the North Carolina coast. So in late 1969, when handsome Chase Andrews is found dead, the locals immediately suspect Kya Clark, the so-called Marsh Girl. But Kya is not what they say. Sensitive and intelligent, she has survived for years alone in the marsh that she calls home, finding friends in the gulls and lessons in the sand. Then the time comes when she yearns to be…
I am an academic and development practitioner with decades of experience in the classroom and research and development practice. My research niche is in issues of development in the global South, ranging from social conflict/natural resources conflict, political sociology of African development, decolonization of knowledge, to political economy, and globalization studies. In the above capacity, I have, over the years, taught, researched, and ruminated on the development challenges of the global South, especially Africa. I have consulted for many multi-lateral development agencies working in Africa and focused on different dimensions of development. I have a passion for development and a good knowledge of the high volume of literature on the subject.
I read this book first on a long flight, and I had bought it at my departure airport. It was chosen because of my belief that Mandela thus far remains the quintessential leader that most of Africa still lacks!
An autobiography captures the nuanced structural trajectories and diverse challenges of the African state. A story of struggle, but it demonstrates the value of resilience and the need for painstaking commitment to the ideals of national development, despite the pain it may cause to the leader. A must-read for leaders and aspiring leaders in Africa, since despite focusing on the peculiar context of South Africa and the struggles of Mandela, it also embodies fine examples for principled leadership and statecraft that are still very much relevant now.
'The authentic voice of Mandela shines through this book . . . humane, dignified and magnificently unembittered' The Times
The riveting memoirs of the outstanding moral and political leader of our time, A Long Walk to Freedom brilliantly re-creates the drama of the experiences that helped shape Nelson Mandela's destiny. Emotive, compelling and uplifting, A Long Walk to Freedom is the exhilarating story of an epic life; a story of hardship, resilience and ultimate triumph told with the clarity and eloquence of a born leader.
Mia Lark is running out of options. There is only one way to change the score: the fantasy planet Revivium.
Armed with the powerful magic in the helm and the friendly AI, Hex that goes with it, Mia throws caution out the window. It’s time to find the main guildhall…
I am a fourth-generation Asian New Zealander who always felt ‘other’ growing up. When I was little, I hated being asked ‘where are you from?’ because I wanted to be seen as ‘just’ a New Zealander. This frustration shaped a lot of my race and identity journey, and I started reading books about other people’s personal experiences because it made me feel seen. These books also helped me recognize the richness and humanity behind my family’s story. I hope this beautiful list of books will resonate with your experiences or give you insight into a new corner of the world.
I have a special attachment to this book—I first read it as a child, and come back to it repeatedly because I love the way Cunxin describes his life. Every time I read it, I ache for him as he says goodbye to his tiny Chinese village (and beloved mother) and goes over to the harsh world of ballet.
This book might not be a plot-driven thriller, nor a meditation on identity, but it tells a vibrant and uplifting journey. Readers get to see Cunxin grow from a terrified boy who desperately misses home, to an ambitious ballet star. We get to root for him through traveling, falling in love, and eventually having to reconfigure his relationship with China as home. Cunxin tells the story of his life in an honest and endearing voice, and I root for him from beginning to end.
The extraordinary memoir of a peasant boy raised in rural Maoist China who was plucked from his village to study ballet and went on to become one of the greatest dancers of his generation.
From a desperately poor village in northeast China, at age eleven, Li Cunxin was chosen by Madame Mao's cultural delegates to be taken from his rural home and brought to Beijing, where he would study ballet. In 1979, the young dancer arrived in Texas as part of a cultural exchange, only to fall in love with America-and with an American woman. Two years…
A century of prejudice is laid bare in these books, but within their pages are countless subtle and overt ways that gay Australian men have given homophobes the big middle finger. We may not always have thrived, but through resistance, migration, verbal agility, notoriety, and sheer resilience, collectively we have conquered. I stand on enormous shoulders at a time when queer writing is proliferating on an inevitable tide of equality that has risen across my lifetime in this country. My selections encompass first nations and migrant stories, some of the pioneers of our gay literature, and ‘outside’ voices bravely looking in to discern us with dignity.
Danny Kelly is a living, breathing gay Greek protagonist, and the choices this driven young competitive swimmer faces about loving relationships—while he’s in the pursuit of athletic prowess—are written with a resounding ring of truth. Tsiolkas’ visceral sex scenes, underpinned by gripping descriptions of the desires behind the mechanics, speak to much more than the act itself. They go to the heart of identity in a novel with so many layers of self-definition: the migrant, the working class hero, the quintessential male, the stereotypical gay, the success story, and the abject failure. That Danny escapes his ambition alive is a miracle, and it has everything to do with digging deep and staring down expectations.
From the international bestselling and Booker Prize nominated author of The Slap comes a blazingly brilliant new novel.
Longlisted for the 2014 IMPAC Dublin Literary Award
You lose everything. In front of everyone. Where do you go from here?
Daniel Kelly, a talented young swimmer, has one chance to escape his working-class upbringing. His astonishing ability in the pool should drive him to fame and fortune, as well as his revenge on the rich boys at the private school to which he has won a sports scholarship. Everything Danny has ever done, every sacrifice his family has ever made, has…
Dominique Antiglio is a Qualified Sophrologist, former Osteopath, and best-selling author based in London. Sophrology is a simple practice for mental well-being supporting everyone to tap into the unlimited resources of consciousness and become empowered in daily life. Having used Sophrology to overcome her own issues as a teenager, Dominique is passionate about how each one of us can find resilience and meaning through difficult times. She is a world-leading Sophrologist, founder of BeSophro, a leading Sophrology clinic in London and a Sophrology platform so everyone can learn to practice the method based on relaxation, breathing, visualisation and movement. Dominique gained her Master's in Caycedian Sophrology under Professor Caycedo.
I love this book. It's such an incredible story about conquering challenges that appear near-impossible. Diana Nyad was the first person in history to swim 103 miles non-stop from Cuba to Florida which she did successfully on her 5th attempt at 64 years old! What is fascinating is how she managed to separate herself from negative thinking - from doctors and the public, not to mention her own.
Winner of the Cross Sports International Autobiography of the Year award
In the 1970s, Diana Nyad was widely regarded as the greatest long-distance swimmer in the world and set many world records, such as circling Manhattan Island and crossing the 102.5 miles between the Bahamas and Florida. But one record continually eluded her: becoming the first woman to swim between Cuba and the Florida Keys without a shark cage. Finally, in September 2013, after four failed attempts and at the age of sixty-four, Diana completed the crossing after two days and two nights of continuous swimming - 53 consecutive hours,…
Winner of the 2024 New Mexico - Arizona Book Award.
In this deeply researched novel of America's most celebrated outlaw, Mark Warren sheds light on the human side of Billy the Kid and reveals the intimate stories of the lesser-known players in his legendary life of crime. Warren's fictional composer…
I've penned 11 novels and numerous essays, and if there's one thread that ties them all together, it's rawness. I gravitate towards reading books and watching films where writers peel back the layers of their lives, exposing past wounds and delving into what they've learned from them. As an entrepreneur with a master's degree in marketing, I’ve found that this kind of vulnerability is not only compelling but essential in any form of storytelling. Whether I’m crafting a narrative for a new startup or reflecting on my own experiences for a novel, it’s this unfiltered honesty that resonates deeply with audiences.
Yuknavitch's prose is less a narrative and more a visceral experience. Reading it is like being caught in a riptide—disorienting, intense, and ultimately exhilarating. Her exploration of grief, sexuality, and survival doesn’t just skim the surface; it dives deep into the murky waters of human existence.
The raw honesty of her writing is both brutal and beautiful, making you feel like you’ve been handed the author’s very soul—scuffed, scarred, and utterly captivating.
From the debris of her troubled early life, Lidia Yuknavitch weaves an astonishing tale of survival. A kind of memoir that is also a paean to the pursuit of beauty, self-expression, desire - for men and women - and the exhilaration of swimming, The Chronology of Water lays a life bare.
It is a life that navigates, and transcends, abuse, addiction, self-destruction and the crushing loss of a stillborn child. It is the life of a misfit, one that forges a fierce and untrodden path to creativity and comes together in the shape of love.
I’m a travel writer, photographer, and lover of wilderness. I am the co-author of three travel guides about swimming: Places We Swim Australia, Places We Swim Sydney, and my new book, listed below. Together with my wife, we write about the connection between water, wilderness, and culture. I am fascinated with how people and nature interact and change one another. All of these books and authors on my list reveal how their experiences in nature have fuelled, anchored them, and inspired their craft.
My wife and I felt a kinship with Bonnie when we discovered her writing, or maybe she was just the person we wanted to be.
She is a New York Times journalist, a surfer, and a swimmer. Although she lives in San Francisco, she has spent some time living in Australia (Sydney, where we live), and she has experienced some of our local swimming spots, as well as many in California (her locals).
In this book, Bonnie artfully expresses the intangible feelings many of us feel about swimming and water and how we engage with it as humans. The best writers can articulate feelings and experiences in a way that makes you feel seen. This is one of those books for me.
“A fascinating and beautifully written love letter to water. I was enchanted by this book." —Rebecca Skloot, bestselling author of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
We swim in freezing Arctic waters and piranha-infested rivers to test our limits. We swim for pleasure, for exercise, for healing. But humans, unlike other animals that are drawn to water, are not naturalborn swimmers. We must be taught. Our evolutionary ancestors learned for survival; today, swimming is one of the most popular activities in the world. Why We Swim is propelled by stories of Olympic champions, a Baghdad swim club that meets…
If you want to live your best life, you’ll need to face some fears. I’ve faced a lot of my fears: great white sharks, sky-diving, caves, spiders, meat sauces. I’m still scared, but what else can I do? Stay in bed my whole life? I love writing and illustrating for kids. It’s how I’ve spent the last twenty years. I’ve written and/or illustrated almost fifty books. The scariest part is figuring out how to start. Thinking of an ending is scary too. Then there’s all that stuff in the middle. Ugh! My first books about facing fears were Hippo and Rabbit. Now, Scaredy Cats. Fear gives me ideas!
I feel like I lived this story as a kid. I’ll bet a lot of kids do. A young boy overcomes his fear of the high dive.
Step by step, Gaia Cornwall takes us through Jabari’s jump. Jabari starts by telling his dad he’s not scared at all. He clearly is. He delays, makes excuses. Dad never pushes. He wants this to be Jabari’s decision, Jabari’s victory. It’s so relatable, the perspective even changes to first person once Jabari is high above the pool.
Everything rings true. It’s exactly what a scared kid would say and do. It’s exactly what I said and did when I was Jabari’s age trying to summon my own courage on the high dive. Except when I hit the water, my swim trunks fell off.
Working up the courage to take a big, important leap is hard, but Jabari is almost absolutely ready to make a giant splash.
In a sweet tale of overcoming your fears, debut author-illustrator Gaia Cornwall captures a moment at the swimming pool between a patient and encouraging father and a determined little boy you can't help but root for. Jabari is definitely ready to jump off the diving board. He's finished his swimming lessons and passed his swimming test, and he's a great jumper, so he's not scared at all. "Looks easy," says Jabari, watching the other kids take their…
Ramon Ramirez’s Dog is a collection of essays written over the years about the adventures and misadventures, mostly outside but occasionally inside the diplomatic career of a U.S. ambassador. Common threads weaving the stories together are a desire for a life well-lived, balancing career with family and friends, keeping physically…
I resonate with these stories; I feel a kinship with authors of books about teen sexual abuse. My heart breaks for another innocent young person, and I am also inspired by the different ways we find healing and peace. I am so grateful for my healing journey that I want to share what helped me with others who are looking for greater peace with their struggles and scars. I am proud to join the ranks of these authors because we all shine a spotlight on the harm done by this too-common abuse of the trust and innocence of teenage girls.
In this memoir, we meet Kim as a teen athlete and an Olympic-bound swimmer. The book shows the intense training environment of young athletes of this caliber experience, and as I read it, I was filled with both admiration and a deep uneasiness.
She’s so vulnerable to her esteemed coach, as I was to my teacher. Swimming was her life, and her coach held her future in his hands. When the inevitable grooming and seduction began, my heart sank further in outrage and sorrow. Like me, Kim finds her way out, but as with all young girls groomed and betrayed, it is not easy.
In 1970s Cincinnati, Kim's overwhelmed, financially stressed parents dragged her and her four younger siblings into swimming-starting with a nearby motel pool-as a way to keep them occupied and out of their way. When Kim was eleven, they began leaving the kids at home with a sitter while they traveled the Midwest, where they sold imported wooden ornaments from their motorhome. But when Kim's six-year-old brother crashed his new Cheater Slick bike and the babysitter deserted the children, what started as an accident became a pattern: Mom and Dad leaving for weeks at a time and the kids wrestling with…
