Literary world left speechless after surf journalist named one of 2022’s best true crime writers by culturally significant New York Times!

Take that, Nick Carroll.

The sun rose, today, on a bewildered literary community as it was revealed that The New York Times, arbiter of to read and what not to read, had named surf journalist Chas Smith’s Blessed are the Bank Robbers to its year-end list of best true crime books.

Smith, who was notified of the honor while frantically attempting to wedge Slovakian supermodel Veronika Rajek into a story about wave forecasting, was left surprised.

The book, described as “a rollicking true story of Bibles and bank robberies in Southern California, from a talented and highly praised gonzo journalist,” was first released in March 15.

Tina Jordan, deputy editor of the Book Review, wrote, “In Southern California in the late 1960s, the Courson family was a kind of ‘gilded evangelical Christian Camelot,’ Chas Smith writes in BLESSED ARE THE BANK ROBBERS: The True Adventures of an Evangelical Outlaw, which is filled with rich and powerful megachurch pastors. Smith — himself a member of the Courson family — tells the story of his cousin Danny, known as the ‘Floppy Hat Bandit.’ Danny once held up 19 banks in six weeks, and by Smith’s count, “he has to be within spitting distance of the U.S. record for bank robberies.”

The surf world, imagining Smith as half illiterate, at best, was equally befuddled.

You can hear him discuss the Pipe Masters as the ultimate gilded lily and other important matters below.