Swim Through the Darkness

Graphic by Angelie Zaslavsky
“Swim Through the Darkness” by Mike Stax was easily the most moving and inspiring book I read in 2016. Stax’s biography of Craig Smith — a promising musician and songwriter who took a wrong turn at the dawning of the Age of Aquarius, and fell forever through the cracks of society — is a deeply heartbreaking one. But the book also doubles as a fascinating detective story, and the author’s suspenseful recounting of his nearly 15-year search for Smith makes “Swim Through the Darkness” read like the “Citizen Kane” of rock bios.
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