Barbarian Days: Book Review on Restlessness and the Search for More

A book, a trip, and the lingering question of what lies beyond the life we know.

Things have a funny way of finding us. A song from an artist whose discography you thought you had fully explored. A hidden coffee shop in your neighborhood. A person, a belief, a book. These things arrive unexpectedly, completing this silly dance that is life—leaving us wondering how we ever went a day without them.

That’s how I feel about every life-changing book I’ve ever read. Mostly memoirs and biographies, these stories have always found me at the perfect time—or at least, when I needed them most.

Barbarian Days found me on a gray day at the office early in February. I was deep into an audit for a niche target audience and, half out of curiosity, half out of boredom, I started reading an interview with someone I’ve long admired. When asked about books, he mentioned that Barbarian Days was something of a bible to him—one he revisited multiple times a year. My love of surf literature, coupled with the recommendation from someone I respected and felt aligned with, was enough to make me check McNally’s website to see if they had it in stock. They did. I picked it up after work, unaware that I was in for a ride.

I’ve always been drawn to surf books. There’s something about that world that has long fascinated me. The holistic nature of surfing—both mental and physical—feels applicable to so many aspects of life. The sport’s oneness has always spoken to me.

So, in some ways, I thought I knew what Barbarian Days would entail. Needless to say, I was unpleasantly surprised when the book opened with the author’s brutal account of a violent youth in Hawaii. Far from idyllic descriptions of unspoiled beaches and mystical realizations—though there are some—this book, like the oceans it describes, is rough. It confronted me with truths about growing up, the limits of Western life, and the sacrifices that come with chasing something greater. But it also filled me with awe. Awe for the beauty and vastness of our planet. Awe for the sheer devotion and knowledge surfers possess. Awe for the author and his friends, who abandoned the comfort of their Southern California lives to chase waves—and something more. It reinforced my belief that surfing isn’t just a sport. It’s a way of life.

To surf is to surrender. To study each wave, break, current, and wind pattern. To keep up with forecasts, drop everything in pursuit of a single perfect ride. To arrange trips to faraway places based on elusive rumors. To know when to say no to yourself. It is all-consuming.

Which brings me back to the idea that this book found me at the perfect time. Barbarian Days is essentially an autobiography told through the lens of surfing. Much of it covers the author’s early adulthood—the very stage I find myself in now.

Autobiographies from those I consider the greats have always been my favorite genre, largely because they allow me to glimpse lives so different from my own. These stories allow me to grasp the vastness and nuances of the Human experience. We are all blessed with the divine gift of life, each dealt a different hand, but only a few push its possibilities to the fullest. Having only known life in northern cities—surrounded by concrete—I’ve always yearned for something closer to the source. Something real. Unspoiled. Free of premeditated design. Reading about other people’s lives has always been my way of imagining another existence—one far removed from structured neighborhoods, expectations, and routine. Barbarian Days took that to another level.

I say this as someone growing increasingly restless in a corporate job. Reading about Finnegan’s travels left me wide-eyed, more eager than ever to explore the endless possibilities of life. If only willing to compromise, to surrender to what each place has to offer. To experience everything that lies beyond what I’ve ever known. A pact I’d be willing to make. I think?

Much of Finnegan’s adventures (no spoilers as I hope some of you will read it) take place in his twenties. Rarely does he look back, always riding the wave. An ethos I made mine long ago already. He sometimes wonders if he’s squandered his life away, but regret never finds him. Being at a pivotal point in my own life—and I say this loosely, aware of the abundance of time I have ahead—I found myself asking similar questions throughout the book. Is this it? The answer is no.

Halfway through reading Barbarian Days, I took a trip to Los Angeles, my sanctuary. The timing, once again, couldn’t have been better.

I had been ill. The weather in Manhattan had become unbearable. I needed to be in nature.

The sight of that endless blue strip, the sun hitting my face in the LAX parking lot—I was revived.

What followed only deepened my longing for a life away from city sirens, concrete, skyscrapers, and crowded streets. I spent four days outdoors, from sunrise to sunset, surrounded by people who had long been riding their own wave—trusting it would one day take them home. Hearing my friends’ stories, experiencing a rhythm so different from my usual city routine, and having Finnegan’s words echo in my mind confirmed something I had already begun to suspect: this other way of life was the one I was chasing.

And yet, despite the book’s radical departure from the conventional, I can’t stop thinking about how normal, in the end, the author’s life is. After years of resisting a mapped-out existence, he ends up (to some extent) right where his parents had hoped he’d be. Living much like the people he had criticized in his youth.

Can a Westerner ever truly be untamed? Is the thrill of the unknown worth more than comfort? Is this really all there is to it? Just some dad lore?

These questions linger in my mind.

(I do not own the rights to some of the images, but the curation and layout of this mood board are my original work.)