Tuesday, June 23, 2026

Former Obama Speechwriter Brings His Surfing Memoir to Vroman’s

David Litt discusses a year and a half of learning to ride waves with a brother-in-law who is his political opposite

Former Obama speechwriter David Litt will discuss and sign his memoir about learning to surf Tuesday at 7 p.m. at Vroman’s Bookstore, the Colorado Boulevard shop the Pasadena Chamber of Commerce describes as Southern California’s oldest and largest independent bookstore.

The book, It’s Only Drowning, recounts how Litt took up surfing in his mid-30s with help from his brother-in-law, Matt Kappler — an electrician and Joe Rogan listener whom Litt describes as his cultural and political opposite. According to the publisher, Simon & Schuster, the memoir follows the pair from the Jersey Shore to California, Spain and Hawaii’s North Shore. The publisher lists the title as a national bestseller and a 2025 Booklist Editors’ Choice selection.

Litt joined the White House as a speechwriter in 2011 and left in 2016 as a senior presidential speechwriter to President Barack Obama. The publisher notes he was described as “the comic muse for the president” for his work on White House Correspondents’ Dinner monologues. He is the New York Times bestselling author of Thanks, Obama and Democracy in One Book or Less, according to Simon & Schuster.

He began surf lessons at age 35 in Asbury Park, New Jersey, where he lives part of the year. In the book, he writes that learning to surf is “like learning a language that wants to kill you.” In an interview, Litt said he turned to the water at a point when he “needed to try something new, but was feeling pretty adrift.”

In an NPR interview, Litt said the hours he and Kappler spent in the water became “neutral ground” — a space that was not coded liberal or conservative at a divided national moment. The memoir spans roughly a year and a half of his progress from novice to surfing Hawaii’s North Shore.

The Vroman’s appearance is listed as an adult event and book signing. The store, founded in 1894, says a purchase of the book supports its events. The Pasadena stop falls within a busy week of author signings at Vroman’s, which hosts hundreds of events a year, according to the Pasadena Chamber.

Litt has toured widely for the title, which Gallery Books published in 2025; earlier stops included Bookshop Santa Cruz in November 2025 and Warwick’s. In one podcast interview about why he kept at the sport despite repeated wipeouts, he said, “I think that becoming a better surfer is making me a better person.”

Vroman’s is at 695 E. Colorado Blvd. The store is open Monday through Saturday until 9 p.m. and can be reached at (626) 449-5320.

Asked on NPR about a critical review of how he portrayed his brother-in-law, Litt said: “I respectfully disagree with that. All memoirs, to me, are about change.” In that same interview, he framed the book as a story about how much he learned from a person he had assumed he had nothing in common with.