The Greek Summer — John Douglas Miller

Loosely based on the author's experiences as a California lifeguard in the 60's, this delightful and hilarious novel evokes the memory of a more innocent time. A group of young men, coming of age in an ideal setting discover the Greek philosophers, and learn that the world of mind and ideas is far more fascinating than anything they have ever known. The story begins in the present, and unfolds in a series of flashbacks as they sit on the rocks above La Jolla Cove, drinking beer and talking about what was going on forty years before at the swimming pool. The Greek Summer sets Socrates and Plato, Nietzsche and Sartre, against a backdrop of swimming pools, blue skies, and beaches, in pre-Vietnam Southern California.