Close to Shore - Michael Capuzzo

Combining rich historical detail and a harrowing, pulse-pounding narrative, Close
to Shore brilliantly re-creates the summer of 1916, when a rogue Great White shark
attacked swimmers along the New Jersey shore, triggering mass hysteria and launching
the most extensive shark hunt in history.

In July 1916 a lone Great White left its usual deep-ocean habitat and headed in
the direction of the New Jersey shoreline.
There, near the towns of Beach Haven
and Spring Lake--and, incredibly, a farming community eleven miles inland--the most
ferocious and unpredictable of predators began a deadly rampage: the first shark
attacks on swimmers in U.S. history.


Capuzzo interweaves a vivid portrait of the era and meticulously drawn characters
with chilling accounts of the shark's five attacks and the frenzied hunt that ensued. From the unnerving inevitability of the first attack
on the esteemed son of a prosperous Philadelphia physician to the spine-tingling
moment when a farm boy swimming in Matawan Creek feels the sandpaper-like skin of
the passing shark, Close to Shore is an undeniably gripping saga.

Heightening the
drama are stories of the resulting panic in the citizenry, press and politicians,
and of colorful personalities such as Herman Oelrichs, a flamboyant millionaire who
made a bet that a shark was no match for a man (and set out to prove it); Museum
of Natural History ichthyologist John Treadwell Nichols, faced with the challenge
of stopping a mythic sea creature about which little was known; and, most memorable,
the rogue Great White itself moving through a world that couldn't conceive of either
its destructive power or its moral right to destroy.

Scrupulously researched and
superbly written, Close to Shore brings to life a breathtaking, pivotal moment in
American history. Masterfully written and suffused with fascinating period detail
and insights into the science and behavior of sharks, Close to Shore recounts a breathtaking,
pivotal moment in American history with startling immediacy.