Geese Are Never Swans
Gus’s life is about one thing―swimming. He is determined to make it to the Olympics and he knows that the only coach in town who can get him there is Coach Marks. So it seems like a simple plan: convince Coach Marks to train him. Everything from there on in is just hard work – and Gus has never been afraid of hard work.
But there are a few complications. For one thing, Coach Marks was Danny’s coach. Danny, Gus’s older brother, committed suicide after failing to make the national swimming team, a big step on the way to the Olympics. And for another thing, Gus and Danny didn’t exactly get along when Danny was alive. Gus never liked living in Danny’s shadow, and that shadow has grown even longer since Danny’s death.
In this powerful novel about the punishing and the healing nature of sports, Gus’s rage threatens to swallow him at every turn. He’s angry at his brother, his mother, his coach . . . even himself. But as he works through his feelings and toward his goal, Gus does everything he can to channel his anger into excelling at the sport that he and Danny both loved, finding solace in the same place he must face his demons: the water.
Below is a list of organizations and resources available to support the mental well-being of student athletes:
The Hidden Opponent
Raising awareness for student-athlete mental health, the Hidden Opponent empowers athletes to face the hidden opponent together as a community.
instagram.com/thehiddenopponent/
Michael Phelps Foundation
Focused on promoting water safety, healthy living (mental and physical), and the pursuit of dreams, especially for children.
michaelphelpsfoundation.org
TaskForce
The original art presented in this book was curated by TaskForce, a creative agency that collaborates with the most influential non- profits, brands, and people taking on the most pressing challenges facing our state, our nation, and our world. TaskForce builds capacity and community for those shaping a more empathetic society through public opinion and policy.
For more information, please visit taskforce.pr
Artist Biographies
Artists are listed in the order in which their work appears in the book.
BEDELGEUSE
Bedelgeuse (Travis Bedel) is the anatomical collage work and alias for artist Travis Bedel. Travis’s wild amalgamation of botanical, zoological, and anatomical imagery produces synergistic visuals that represent humanity’s inherent relationship to nature and the universe.
I sought to manifest an image that represented the crushing darkness of depression. Predatory sea creatures and kelp wrap around the figure, as if to keep them drowned in the grips of their suffering. From above, they are being pulled toward sparkling light from the surface, out from the darkness below.
DEEDEE CHERIEL
Deedee Cheriel is an Indian American artist living and working in Los Angeles. With influences derived from such opposites as East Indian temple imagery, punk rock, and her Pacific Northwest natural environment, her images are indications of how we try to connect ourselves to others and how these satirical and heroic efforts are episodes of compassion and discomfort.
In searching for an image to create for this book, I wanted to use bold loose strokes to convey flow and movement. I used white to create negative spaces to convey beauty and tension, overlapping them with bold images of anthropomorphic beings connecting and disconnecting with others.
Adam Enrique Rodriguez
Born and raised in Indio, California, Adam Enrique Rodriguez is known for his signature style of deconstructed faces and human figures. He incorporates abstraction with classical aspects, in an ongoing conversation around psychology and the human condition. Rodriguez has made art for charitable and community organizations, as well as more than twenty large-scale murals in commercial spaces, private residences, and music festivals throughout California.
For my work in Geese Are Never Swans, I highlight the intensity of the story’s vibrant character; the passion and the confusion in the life of a young athlete navigating through personal traumas, mental health, and triumphs; and the raw emotion of the human experience that connects us all.
Augustine Kofie
Born and based in Los Angeles and active in the Southern California graffiti scene since the midnineties, Augustine Kofie works in painting, collage, and mural interventions. Kofie’s fine art practice draws together the languages of graffiti’s deconstructive lettering, street culture, mechanical drafting, modern architecture, contemporary music, and 1960s–80s iconography.
My painting is inspired by the novel’s aquatic theme in its palette of blues, greens, and aquamarines, as well as its compositional elements of rip- ple and reflection. Like much of my work, the painting harmonizes opposing and contradictory dynamics in a quest for balance. In this, it reflects Gus’s quest to find a path through the struggles and challenges of his life. Sport, like art, becomes a way to organize one’s feelings, to take control of the breakage, and to create order out of chaos.
Najeebah Al-Ghadban
Najeebah Al-Ghadban is a designer and collage artist from Kuwait. Her collage work has been featured in the New York Times Magazine, the California Sunday Magazine, and Anxy magazine. She is currently a designer for the NYT Mag Labs in New York.
