Swimming

One of the main themes of Everything I Never Told You is Swimming. We first encounter the theme at the end of Chapter 1 when the narrator tells readers that Lydia had refused to take swimming lessons at the local community pool. When someone notices that a boat has been drifting in the center of the lake, the police decide to drag the lake and find Lydia's body in the bottom. Then, further into the story the reader witnesses the painfully awkward game of Marco Polo that Nath experiences when he is a boy the summer that his mother abandoned him. James notes that he had been on the swim team in high school, and during the scene at the pool he notes his private hopes that Nath will excel in Swimming and be on the team as well. James hopes he will make friends this way...