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Summary: A good summertime yarn...and it's true!
Review: This is an interesting and engaging step into history when going to the beach first became popular and it was widely believed that sharks were harmless. Somebody should have told the shark, who seemingly gets carried from its normal environment and becomes increasingly violent as it gets more and more disoriented. The attacks on humans at the seashore are horrifying, and the story builds to a climax as the shark moves up a creek far away from the ocean and homes in on boys splashing in the summer sun. I found this book to be in the same genre as "Isaac's Storm," in which we learn of the misconceptions of nature held by Americans at the time. A great read for the beach...and you'll be more careful about dipping a toe in the ocean!
Rating:
Summary: Gripping Tale
Review: The author tells a wonderful, frightening story of a killer shark prowling the Jersey Shore and even up the river to Matewan, where it killed two and maimed one. The author has a really good feel for the time period and the people. The amount of research that he must have done to paint such vivid pictures must have been huge. I only caught one minor error. William K. Vanderbilt was not Hermann Oelrichs' brother in law. Their wives were the leaders of society in Newport and New York with Mamie Fish, but not related. This is an incredibly fast read and I recommend it highly.
Rating: 
Summary: Reminded me of "Jaws", but...
Review: ...this book isn't "Jaws" so don't expect sharks attacks to start happening in the very first chapter. In fact, it takes a quarter of the book just to get to the first shark attack. The author takes a lot of time setting up the scene and trying to give the reader a sense of what it was like to live in 1916 and he succeeds.... but a little too well. I think the book could have used some heavy editing here and there, especially the removal of excessing "this-was-what-it-was-like-living-in-1916" text. I found myself skipping pages here and there saying to myself, "Alright, already! I get the point. It's 1916!" The long build-up to the first shark attack, and then another long build-up to the next shark attack does get a bit tiresome. But by the time we get to the climactic attacks, several in one day, I was reading every word and could barely put the book down.
Rating:
Summary: Great Read
Review: I loved this book. It remided me a bit of "Ragtime" in the way it blended the history and society of the time into the story. A great summer read!
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Summary: Sea Monsters, Science, and History
Review: Close to Shore is a superbly written book that vividly portrays man's timeless fear of monsters from the deep. The book has all of the suspense, terror, and excitement one would expect from a story about man-eating sharks. But, it also provides a thoroughly researched analysis of what science knows and doesn't know about shark behvior. The book draws on sources and references from the late 19th century through the present day as it documents our evolving knowledge of sharks. In addition, Michael Capuzzo has done a masterful job of developing the historical setting in which the shark attacks took place during the summer of 1916. Man's increasing ability to use technology to master his environment is confronted with his helplessness during the shark attacks. This book represents an important contribution to the social history of the Progressive Era on the eve of the U.S. entry into World War I. The book will be of interest to scholars of early 20th century American history and should find a place on college reading lists for American studies courses.
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Summary: Close to Shore - Or safe on shore?
Review: In what could be seen as an act of amazing prescience, Michael Capuzzo has written a book about one of the great shark scares in American history at exactly the time when sharks and shark attacks have been thrust to the forefront of the evening news. Make no mistake, Capuzzo's Close to Shore - A True Story of Terror in an Age of Innocence is no profit-driven headline grabber. In Close to Shore Capuzzo recounts the events surrounding a series of Shark attacks along the Jersey shore in the early 1900's with almost lyrical style. In writing a book that easily could have devolved into a "shocking tell all" or "incredible true story" Capuzzo has exercised considerable restraint. In Close to Shore the author has instead taken the authorial high road and wrought the tale, not only of the people involved, but also of the shark itself. Of course much of the shark side of the story is supposition, but it in no way detracts from the story. Based on obviously thorough and spirited research, Capuzzo's various segues into the imagined life of the shark instead propel the story ahead while lifting it from one of "Look what happened in the water" to a more complete and substantive tale of a series of profound meetings between two of the earths top predators. Around this primeval exchange Capuzzo wraps descriptive passages and narrative interludes which allow the reader to fully understand the context of the times in which the attacks take place. In creating a sense of place for the reader Capuzzo's writing truly shines; his descriptions are evocative and concise without being pedantic - in fact, reading his descriptive prose is much like looking at sepia-toned photographs from the age that provides the backdrop to events. For the casual reader Capuzzo's book provides an intelligent yet entertaining read. For avid historians and interested marine biologists the story may be light on hard fact but nonetheless it manages to encompass some important themes and argue for objectivity in analysing events which all but preclude objectivity by virtue of their horrific nature. Ultimately the subject of this book is a violent and disturbing one, but Capuzzo handles it with a grace and decorum that deserves an audience. If anything, the one failing of this book in a strictly literary sense is its rather weak denouement, but the author should be applauded for having the courage not to "beef up" the ending after spinning such a engrossing tale. At ... this book is expensive, but well worth the cost. Given the recent events along the coast of Florida this book is even more valuable as source of informed perspective which can give shape and order to a series of apparently unpredictable and bloody events. A great read for the summer season and one well worth passing along.
Rating: 
Summary: Dime a Dozen
Review: After kicking and screaming through Close to Shore I decided to think more openly about the fact I waited to get two thirds through a shark book before hearing about a shark attack. The real problem here is that I read Twelve Days of Real Terror before Cappuzzo's embellished version. The guts of this commentary is that anyone could and will do what Cappuzo did. His writing is fine and it is also fine to re-write a historic event. I just saw something so unique and unmatchable in the other book by Dr. Fernicola. Is it any wonder that Twelve Days of Terror has beat out Close to Shore in NJ the entire summer--and that's despite a multimillion dollar ad campaign by Broadway.....
Rating: 
Summary: Not as good as "Twelve Days of Terror"
Review: "Close to Shore" was disappointing to me. The author seemed to have only 1/3 the material needed to fill a book of that length. The first 80 or so pages go by with no shark encounters, and long digressions into local family history. While entertaining at times, the story was very rambling with frequent side tracks. "Twelve Days of Terror" was much more to the point and informative.
Rating:
Summary: Disappointing
Review: I forced myself to read the first three chapters because I was so excited to get to the shark attack parts, but I haven't read one yet. I started to skip through the pages looking for anything about sharks...I haven't found it yet. So far it is a long drawn out book about nothing. No action, no plot & no sharks yet! I am not sure if I will ever open the book again, so I may never find out what happens in the end. At this point I don't really care. I am an avid book reader and this book is a big disappointment.
Rating:
Summary: The More We Change, the More We Stay the Same
Review: Is anyone out there who does not give an involuntary shiver at the thought of a shark attack? In spite of 1916 assurances that "there had never been a shark attack on any United States coast," the merest rumor set off a full-scale panic. "Close to Shore" is a delightful picture of life in these United States circa. 1916. The author has done his homework and recreates the fashions, habits, and lifestyles of the new novelty: a day (or week, or month) at the beach. Though we may dress differently, even think differently than our relatives of 1916; I venture to say we would react to the thought of a man-eating shark(s) prowling our shores in exactly the same way. This is not a blood and guts tale of gore. It does not depict the great white shark as a monster, and for this I give the book full marks. It has interesting information about sharks in general, and is honest enough to admit there is a lot we do not know. What surprised me is we don't know a great deal more about the great white today than we did 85 years ago. The perpetrator of all this mayhem was a juvenile shark about nine feet and 300 lbs. Makes you wonder what would have happened if the shark were a 20-foot adult weighing 1500 lbs? Thanks to Peter Benchley and "Jaws," we have a pretty good idea.
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