With children these days surrounded on all sides by verbose, controlling parents, teachers and coaches, we rarely encounter the likes of Indi, a confident, blissed-out little surfer who appears to be no more than 7 or 8. With a junior-size board and a well-worn, charmingly saggy tankini, she anchors this unusual debut picture book by Gorman, who was the drummer of the alt-rock band Belly. “The beach is her playground,” Gorman writes, and Indi seems to be riding the waves on her own. (Let’s assume there’s a lifeguard; and imagine, if you must, her parents sitting nearby, confident that, as we learn, “when the surf is big, she is careful.”) She dives beneath breaking waves, waits patiently when the ocean is calm, and gets up each time she falls. The splattery, scratchy black-and-white art looks like digitally remastered photography with a touch of 1950s-style pen-and-ink illustration, rolling over the pages with a few areas of turquoise or rose washes. Gorman’s spare words, in a large, shadowy font, and the images of girl, surfboard and ocean feel united organically, as simultaneously exhilarating and meditative as surfing itself. – New York Times

Gorman, a photographer and surfer himself, draws inspiration from close to home (his daughter is named Indi) as he follows a young surfer through her day. From the opening pages, in-your-face type and equally arresting b&w images create a visceral sense of Indi’s power and competence. “Indi is a surfer,” Gorman begins, opposite a head-on portrait of the girl, who stares solemnly at readers, strands of her short-cropped hair swirling. “She lives on an island. The beach is her playground.” Light teal accents begin to bleed into the b&w imagery in screenprint-like images that have the feel of a digital update of Robert McCloskey’s work. The blue of the ocean gives way to a warning shade of pink in a sequence in which Indi is knocked off her surfboard and “falls… and she falls… and she falls,” as Gorman shows her being tossed by powerful, towering waves. “She never gives up,” he continues as Indi rests on her board, catching her breath in calmer water. Readers won’t need to live anywhere near the sea to recognize Indi’s strength, determination, and capability. Ages 3–7. (June)
http://www.publishersweekly.com/978-1-57687-765-4

“As simultaneously exhilarating and meditative as surfing itself.”
—The New York Times

“Arresting black and white images create a visceral sense of Indi’s power and competence. . . .Screenprint-like images that have the feel of a digital update of Robert McCloskey’s work. . . .Readers won’t need to live anywhere near the sea to recognize Indi’s strength, determination, and capability.”—Publishers Weekly
http://paulsemel.com/exclusive-interview-indi-surfs-author-chris-gorman/