Rating: 
Summary: Lurking With Intent
Review: Michael Capuzzo's narrative style is so good it should be studied by anyone who writes non-fiction. In Close to Shore he imparts to his readers both a gruesomely detailed and yet not entirely unsympathetic catalogue of the life, times and crimes of great white sharks. For instance, they're trainably smart, but far too savage to ever star in any aquatic show; they always have a plan of attack, and never engage in their deadly undersea muggings unless they are absolutely certain they have the advantage, which is why they prefer victims who are in distress. Simultaneously Capuzzo relates a fascinating portrait of America in that last pre-World War One summer of 1916. An America without air-conditioning, cars with tops, television, computers, adequate emergency medicine, or even window screens. Nevertheless, an America which will very likely make you nostalgic for what was and won't be again.The technique of weaving back and forth between the human victims and the shark heightens the suspense and momentum so that when the attacks occur you're familiar enough with both the killer and the victims to feel fear and sympathy for all concerned. Conceived in a ritual so brutal that the female is left as slashed and bloodied as an attack victim, the "pups" she carries start their murderous careers immediately: they cannibalize their own fertilized and unfertilized siblings in utero! Then there is the hasty, pitiless birth. The pups emerge swimming fast and always away from the mother because her instincts tell her to eat anything within range even her own young. The great white's world is programmed from conception to death for one grim purpose: to fill that enormous gaping maw, preferably with fat blubbery sea mammals, but beware on rare occasions, in a severe pinch, human mammals may be substituted. The villain here was a surprisingly small (eight feet, three hundred pound) juvenile--no more than eight years old--whose behavior was aberrant, which is important to bear in mind. Despite centuries of bad press and outright lies, not all great whites are relentless man eaters lurking close to shore in three-feet of surf. A contemporary commentator likens this one to a serial killer. (One of the more appealing aspects of 1916 was that neither that term, nor serial killers themselves, had yet made an appearance on the American scene.) Most likely this chap was still wet behind the ears--or even insane--and unfortunate enough to have been pulled out of the usual great white hunting grounds by a strong current, whereupon he became disoriented and hungry enough to fatally attack swimmers on the New Jersey coast. He then proceeded madly on, to so unlikely a body of water as Mattawan Creek, where the deadly carnage he inflicted bordered on the surreal. But when you start to hate the shark remember he was "just following orders." Whatever immortal hand or eye dared frame this brute's fearful symmetry is a far more frightening entity: Nature, red in tooth and claw.
One more thing, never swim with a dog.
Rating: 
Summary: Too Scattered and Unfocused
Review: Michael Capuzzo sets out to write a period piece on a series of shark attacks off the New Jersey shore in 1916. But by trying to do too much, he fails to do any of them well. Okay, we "get" the changes society was undergoing in 1916. And we get the comparatively primitive state of marine biology at the time.
The author fails to incorporate this social history into the events he describes. Capuzzo can't decide whether to regale the reader with details of life in pre-WWI America, or give the hard facts about the actual events.
In addition, his efforts to describe what the specific animal thought or felt at the time of the attacks simply doesn't work. In this book Capuzzo notes that these events served as the model from which Peter Benchley based his novel "Jaws." It becomes obvious that "Jaws", in turn, served as a basis for "Close to Shore."
Overall, my general impression was that the author: 1) learned a bit about life in New Jersey, 2) stumbled across some interesting material on shark attacks, 3) discovered the specific attacks off New Jersey...
and decided to simply throw it all together into a single book. Finally, the editor left in too much extraneous information. There is an entire to chapter on the theory of rogue sharks that was put forth in the 1940's and 50's. At the end of the chapter the author points out that the theory was not published until 30 years after these attacks, and that since it was published the theory has been refuted by contemporary marine biology... okay, so this theory played no role in the authorities response to these attacks because it was not yet published... and now this same theory is rejected by current science as being, well, wrong. SO WHY DID YOU WASTE MY TIME INCLUDING IT?! This is a question the publisher and editor should be asked. I wanted to like this book but was unable to do so.
Rating:
Summary: A Frightening Look At A True Story
Review: Many reviews did not do justice to this book. It is true that the story was slow to unfold and some of the descriptions were overdone, but the author told the story of what happened in those twelve days with frightening clarity. More than once, I pictured myself attempting to escape an unescapable predator. I also saw myself trying to save one of the sharks many victims to no avail. I even spent hours pondering how I would convince a town that I was not mistaken when I saw a shark in the creek. If you have even a slight interest in shark attacks, this book is a must read.
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting but slow
Review: Mr. Capuzzo gives a thorough accounting of the shark attacks and he should be commended for his historical research of the era as well as the events. However, this is not for the easily bored reader. A good hundred pages of book must be read before the first attack occurs and much narrative follows the last one. In between, few of the individuals involved are defined well enough to make their characters memorable. Perhaps fast-paced thrillers have spoiled the reader's attention span but I believe restructuring this book would have improved it.
Rating:
Summary: Really great
Review: This book is very well written. The author obviously did a lot of research and captures the time period's innocence. The fist part of the book mostly sets the scene of how niave people were about sharks and "evil things" in general. The rest of the novel describes the rouge shark attacks in very graphic details. Parts that I found especially good were about one person feeling hunted but not knowing why and a boy being scraped by the shark's sandpaper skin. Those details are terrifying. Yea, there's gore, but the unknown is much scarier. This book is very good, you can also see where Benchley got many ideas for Jaws.
Rating: 
Summary: Slow-Building Tension, Great Period Descriptions
Review: The suspense in "Close to Shore" built very slowly, but in the meantime the author gives a very detailed feel for life in the early 1900's. In light of the recent attacks in Virginia Beach and Avon, NC, the slow pace is tolerable since it is sustained by a sense of inevitable doom.
I thought the author tried a little too hard to put us inside the shark's mind during the period of the attacks. While it's easy to accept that newspaper accounts and personal journals gave accurate descriptions of the human mindset during that time, who can really say exactly what drove the shark. It calls for more speculation than is sometimes tolerable. Though it certainly makes for dramatic reading to portray the shark as "nature's serial killer," the reader is lead to ask if that isn't a milder version of the same sensationalism that pervaded the newspaper accounts in 1916.
Still, if you're looking for a historical version of "Jaws," you've come to the right place. Interesting to note that Peter Benchley, who authored "Jaws," is now one of the leading advocates for the great white shark as a misunderstood creature in desperate need of preservation.
Rating:
Summary: Not quite what it could have been...
Review: As a young boy I read the sensational and gruesome books of shark attack that were spawned by the phenomenal success of the movie Jaws. These true-life accounts graphically presented in lurid prose select case files for the readers titillation. Capuzzo gamely attempts to combine similar shark attack narration with a period piece of WWI-era America. The problem is it doesn't quite work. In the summer of 1916 a great white shark terrorized the beaches of New Jersey and New York killing three men, one boy, and maiming another. Capuzzo endeavors to bring his readers back to 1916 so that we can experience the time and it's terror for something not then understood. It's a worthy goal and something in which this reader was very eager to participate. But, time and again Capuzzo abruptly yanks the reader back to the future with modern day references and resources which spoil the "age of innocence" which was originally subject matter of enough importance to include in the title. One longs to remain immersed in the era to live the "terror" for what it was then. Instead, this treat is spoiled by Capuzzo's desire to clinically dissect what this "terror" no longer holds for us now. In short, he spoils the fun. As shark attack books go, Close to Shore is as good as any other I've read. My disappointment resides in the realization that this book could have been, in a historical sense, so much more.
Rating:
Summary: A true story of terror
Review: Michael Capuzzo's Close To Shore provides a true story of terror, with narrator Len Cariou's impassioned voice recounting the summer of 1916 when a lone white shark terrorized the New Jesey shore. Shades of Jaws, couched in reality. A fine drama.
Rating:
Summary: could have been great
Review: Like many other reviewers I was disappointed. Having grown up at the Jersey shore I knew the area of the attacks well. And I started reading the book the day a man was attacked by a shark in the Bahamas and finished it just as two more fatal shark attacks happened in North Carolina and Virginia. So talk about relevance. The chapters on the shark were pretty captivating . The alternate chapters on life in the early 1900's were mind-numbing and repetitive.
Tell us once that modesty at the beach was the rule. But don't repeat it in every other paragraph nor feel obligated to describe each bathing suit. . We got it the first time.
It got so that after the first 40 pages or so, I completely skipped over the non-shark chapters and lost very little .
Rating:
Summary: Careless Writing and Editing Detract From This Book
Review: This book was recommended by a friend of mine and I'd spent my high school years in New Jersey not far from the shore. I expected to enjoy the Close to Shore. However, there were many inaccuracies and misstatements in it. These detracted very significantly from my enjoyment of the book. The author and editor both appear to have rushed the book to print with little time spent reviewing what had been written.
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