BiblioVault - Books about Beaches

The Beaches Are Moving

The Drowning of America's Shoreline

Wallace Kaufman and Orrin H. Pilkey Jr.

Duke University Press, 1983

Our beaches are eroding, sinking, washing out right under our houses, hotels, bridges; vacation dreamlands become nightmare scenes of futile revetments, fills, groins, what have you—all thrown up in a frantic defense against the natural system. The romantic desire to live on the seashore is in doomed conflict with an age-old pattern of beach migration. Yet it need not be so. Conservationist Wallace Kaufman teams up with marine geologist Orrin H. Pilkey Jr., in an evaluation of America's beaches from coast to coast, giving sound advice on how to judge a safe beach development from a dangerous one and how to live at the shore sensibly and safely.

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Beaches, Bays, and Barrens

A Natural History of the Jersey Shore

Eric G. Bolen

Rutgers University Press, 2024

The Jersey Shore attracts millions of visitors each year, drawn to its sandy beaches. Yet New Jersey’s coastline contains a richer array of biodiverse habitats than most tourists realize, from seagrass meadows to salt marshes to cranberry bogs.

Beaches, Bays, and Barrens introduces readers to the natural wonders of the Jersey Shore, revealing its unique ecology and fascinating history. The journey begins with the contributions and discoveries of early naturalists who visited the region and an overview of endangered species and natural history, followed by chapters that explore different facets of the shore’s environments. These start with sandy beaches and dunes and culminate in the engaging Pine Barrens, the vital watershed for much of the state’s varied coastline. Along the way, readers will also learn about whaling, decoy carvers, an extinct duck, and the cultivation of wild blueberries.
Including over seventy color photographs, the book also features twenty-three infoboxes that go deep into areas of ecological or historical interest, such as the Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge or the Jaws-like shark attacks of 1916. From Cape May to Sandy Hook, biologist Eric G. Bolen takes you on a guided tour of the Jersey Shore’s rich ecological heritage.

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Beaches, Ruins, Resorts

The Politics of Tourism in the Arab World

Waleed Hazbun

University of Minnesota Press, 2008

Ellie's Strand

Exploring the Edge of the Pacific

M. L. Herring

Oregon State University Press, 2018

Sigrud Olson Nature Writing Award, Notable Children’s Book
Green Earth Book Award, Honor Book

There are days in late winter when the Pacific coast enjoys a brief spell of clear, warm weather. Most of the winter storms have passed and the summer fog has not yet settled in. This is when some coastal communities plan their annual beach clean-ups.

In this sequel to Ellie’s Log and Ricky’s Atlas, Ellie and Ricky travel to the Oregon coast from their home in the Cascade Mountains to help with a one-day beach clean-up. Hoping to find a prized Japanese glass float, they instead find more important natural treasures, and evidence of an ocean that needs its own global-scale clean-up.

Ellie and Ricky are amazed by their discoveries at the edge of the world’s largest ocean. Together, they realize the power of volunteering and grapple with the challenges of ocean conservation. In her journal Ellie records her observations of their adventures in her own words and pictures.

With charming pen-and-ink drawings and a compelling story, Ellie's Strand makes coastal science exciting for upper elementary school students. It will be a treasured companion for young beach explorers everywhere.

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The Jersey Shore Uncovered

A Revealing Season on the Beach

Genovese, Peter

Rutgers University Press, 2003

This is not your typical Jersey Shore book.

Yes, you'll find the obvious-beaches and boardwalks, lifeguards and lighthouses, fishing and food. But Peter Genovese will also take you off the beaten track for an insider's look at this famous (and infamous) 127-mile stretch from Sandy Hook to Cape May.

Birders, tiki hut builders, beach cleaners, wheel-of-chance operators, she-crab soup makers-they're all here. You'll check out an Airstream-only trailer park and visit a Point Pleasant Beach house where the music of Frank Sinatra plays nearly 24/7. Genovese will introduce you to the owner of the Stone Pony and to participants at the grueling Atlantic City Around-the-Island Swim as they describe their battles with tides, exhaustion, and face-stinging jellyfish. All of that, plus you'll find out why Ocean Grove residents write their names on their flowerpots.

Beach reading just doesn't get any better than this.

Spend a summer with Peter Genovese as he chronicles a typical wild and wacky, kitschy and classy season along the New Jersey coastline.

Lifeguards, surfers, beachgoers, birders, ice cream vendors, seashell sellers, banner pilots-they're all here. You'll be on the scene when Atlantic City's mayor officially begins summer by "unlocking the ocean," get a whiff of the state barbeque championship, watch the nation's longest-running all-women lifeguard competition, and even spend a weekend, Survivor-style, on a Barnegat Bay island.

The Ocean City Baby Parade, Clownfest, the state's hottest bikini contest, and the World Series of Surf Fishing are all covered. You'll also meet the folks at the Diamondback Terrapin Conservation Project, the Cape May Migratory Bird Refuge, and the Marine Mammal Stranding Center.

Genovese introduces you to Little Miss Chaos and the King of Corn, the Jersey Shore Hot Dog Queen, and Lucky Leo. You'll go on patrol with the New Jersey State Marine Police, meet the man behind Big Mike's E-Z Bail Bonds, and find salvation at the Boardwalk Chapel.

The Jersey Shore Uncovered flawlessly depicts the timeless allure of New Jersey beach culture. Along with his stories, Genovese brings readers hundreds of color and black-and-white photos that brilliantly capture exactly what makes this 127-mile stretch of shoreline unique. Whether you've never been to a New Jersey beach or you're a Jersey native who spends your summers "down the Shore," you're certain to learn a thing or two from this book. So get settled in your beach chair, put on some suntan lotion, and enjoy.

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The Last Beach

Orrin H. Pilkey and J. Andrew G. Cooper

Duke University Press, 2014

The Last Beach is an urgent call to save the world's beaches while there is still time. The geologists Orrin H. Pilkey and J. Andrew G. Cooper sound the alarm in this frank assessment of our current relationship with beaches and their grim future if we do not change the way we understand and treat our irreplaceable shores. Combining case studies and anecdotes from around the world, they argue that many of the world's developed beaches, including some in Florida and in Spain, are virtually doomed and that we must act immediately to save imperiled beaches.

After explaining beaches as dynamic ecosystems, Pilkey and Cooper assess the harm done by dense oceanfront development accompanied by the construction of massive seawalls to protect new buildings from a shoreline that encroaches as sea levels rise. They discuss the toll taken by sand mining, trash that washes up on beaches, and pollution, which has contaminated not only the water but also, surprisingly, the sand. Acknowledging the challenge of reconciling our actions with our love of beaches, the geologists offer suggestions for reversing course, insisting that given the space, beaches can take care of themselves and provide us with multiple benefits.

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Surf and Rescue

George Freeth and the Birth of California Beach Culture

Patrick Moser

University of Illinois Press, 2022

The mixed-race Hawaiian athlete George Freeth brought surfing to Venice, California, in 1907. Over the next twelve years, Freeth taught Southern Californians to surf and swim while creating a modern lifeguard service that transformed the beach into a destination for fun, leisure, and excitement. Patrick Moser places Freeth’s inspiring life story against the rise of the Southern California beach culture he helped shape and define. Freeth made headlines with his rescue of seven fishermen, an act of heroism that highlighted his innovative lifeguarding techniques. But he also founded California's first surf club and coached both male and female athletes, including Olympic swimming champion and “father of modern surfing” Duke Kahanamoku. Often in financial straits, Freeth persevered as a teacher and lifeguarding pioneer--building a legacy that endured long after his death during the 1919 influenza pandemic.

A compelling merger of biography and sports history, Surf and Rescue brings to light the forgotten figure whose novel way of seeing the beach sparked the imaginations of people around the world.

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Vanishing Sands

Losing Beaches to Mining

Orrin H. Pilkey, Norma J. Longo, William J. Neal, Nelson G. Rangel-Buitrago, Keith C. Pilkey, and Hannah L. Hayes

Duke University Press, 2022

In a time of accelerating sea level rise and increasingly intensifying storms, the world’s sandy beaches and dunes have never been more crucial to protecting coastal environments. Yet, in order to meet the demands of large-scale construction projects, sand mining is stripping beaches and dunes, destroying environments, and exploiting labor in the process. The authors of Vanishing Sands track the devastating impact of legal and illegal sand mining over the past twenty years, ranging from Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean to South America and the eastern United States. They show how sand mining has reached crisis levels: beach, dune, and river ecosystems are in danger of being lost forever, while organized crime groups use deadly force to protect their illegal mining operations. Calling for immediate and widespread resistance to sand mining, the authors demonstrate that its cessation is paramount for saving not only beaches, dunes, and associated environments but also lives and tourism economies everywhere.

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