Rating: Summary: First Rate Historical Read!! Review: Mr. Capuzzo's Close to Shore combines the natural history of the great white shark *and what went wrong in the case of this animal* with an overview of the social history of the US in 1916 into a non-fiction read that moves like a good novel. If you are looking for a sensational blood n' slash shark book, go somewhere else. If you are looking for a dry, historical account of the facts, go somewhere else. If you like your history text presented in an interesting and personal way then this is most definately the book for you. I can think of several history/natural history writers who could take a cue from Michael Capuzzo. I hope we see more from this author in the future!! I highly recommend the audio book as well. It is read by Len Cariou *if you know musical theatre then enough said!!* and is a great matching of vocal performer and material.
Rating: Summary: You can't make this stuff up! Review: Nearly unbelievable. The attacks, with their timing and bizarre venues, provide an excellent focal point as the author paints a picture of the culturally turbulent times. I found the book to be very interesting from a cultural-history standpoint, and as a nail-biting story. Having finally recovered from seeing the movie Jaws when I was entirely too young, this story has renewed my unwarrented caution of the NJ shore.
Rating: Summary: Being from the Jersey Shore , I had to read it. Review: Part biology lesson, part social study lesson, part local history lesson, part political history. Wow! That's alot in one book, especially when we're talking about just one shark. I have lived on the Jersey shore and spent a great deal of time at the beach. I could very easily visualize many scenes, and many of the towns mentioned I am quite familiar with. Would this book have more of an impact on those who are familiar with the area? Possibly. I enjoyed the fruits of exhaustive research on the period and the people. At times, I thought the book really strayed very far from the core. I'm not sure I really cared about some of the more politically oriented material or even who was the chief of Icthyology at the Museum of Natural History and how he got there? Seemed like "filler" to me.And about me? Well, I didn't go into the water before this book (thank you JAWS), and I don't plan on doing it in the future either.
Rating: Summary: The Coastal Zone and American Culture Review: The coastal araes of the United States have been recently identified by a Federal Reserve Bank report as the dynamic engine driving almost all of the economic growth in the US. We also know from census data that 80% of Americans live within and hour of the coast and that the coastal areas are the fastest growing, most desireable venue for Americans to live and work. Capuzzo's excellent book reminds us that this love of the beach and sea is a very recent phenomenon in American culture. It also makes quite vivid the realization that Americans have a love/fear relationship with the beach and the sea. I was having early breakfast at a beachfront dive in Hollywood Beach before going to the Nova Ocenographic Center for a day of reasearch on Coastal Zone Management when one of the patrons yelled out "Look, a shark"! Excitement and a modicum of fear rippled through the small breakfast crowd of regulars. The "shark" turned out to be a porpoise playing along the coast on it's own breakfast mission but with shark attack reports on the rise, especially in Florida, this year (2002) and last the first instinct of most people is "shark!" Capuzzo's book will probably be added to my required books in the Coastal Policy web-based course this Fall. ... It just seems to fit my criteria of excellent. Dr. Steffen Schmidt, Ph.D. Professor of Coastal Policy Iowa State University and Nova Oceanographic Center
Rating: Summary: The Love/Fear Relationship With The Beach Review: The coastal areas of the United States have been recently identified by a Federal Reserve Bank report as the dynamic engine driving almost all of the economic growth in the US. We also know from census data that 80% of Americans live within and hour of the coast and that the coastal areas are the fastest growing, most desirable venue for Americans to live and work. Capuzzo's excellent book reminds us that this love of the beach and sea is a very recent phenomenon in American culture. It also makes quite vivid the realization that Americans have had and to this day are trapped in a love/fear relationship with the beach and the sea. I was having early breakfast at a beachfront dive in Hollywood Beach, Florida the other day before going to the Nova Oceanographic Center for a day of research on Coastal Zone Management when one of the patrons yelled out "Look, a shark"! Excitement and a modicum of fear rippled through the small breakfast crowd of "regulars". The "shark" turned out to be a porpoise playing along the coast on it's own breakfast mission! However with shark attack reports on the rise, especially in Florida the first instinct is "shark!" Capuzzo's book will probably be added to my required books in the Coastal Policy web-based course this Fall...It just seems to fit my criteria of excellent story and wonderful factual information. That's a great combination...
Rating: Summary: Richie's Picks: CLOSE TO SHORE Review: The cover of CLOSE TO SHORE sports a photograph of a face that only a mother could love. But as we soon discover by diving into this gripping combination of history and science, such maternal "love" is not forthcoming when it comes to Carcharodon carcharias, the great white shark: "The shark shared the womb with eight to ten other pups, and during gestation, the shark's brain triggered a simple equation: life = food = life. The life was very close, and the shark attacked--devouring the other pups. So the shark began life as a kind of in utero cannibal. Twelve to fourteen months after conception, it emerged having won the most elemental of sibling rivalries--the privilege to be born. "The shark came out of the womb four to five feet long, fifty to eighty-five pounds, hunting. The shark had no air bladder for buoyancy, like most fish, so it had to keep moving, moving and killing and eating, or it would sink to the depths and die. There was no playful puppyhood, no more nurturing from parents. The newborn shark fled its mother. Her instinct was to eat the nearest food source. Nature pumped her full of hormones that diminished her appetite temporarily. Mother's parting gift to her pup was to give it a brief window of escape before she devoured it." Of course, this was not the kind of information understood in 1916 when the experts were at first stubbornly dismissing the possibility that the cause of swimmers being chewed up along the Jersey shore could be shark-related. Mass numbers of Americans swimming in the ocean was a relatively new diversion in those days. In this adaptation of his previously-published adult book, Michael Capuzzo intertwines today's knowledge of sharks with the historic accounts of that carnage nearly a century ago in order to drag us kicking and screaming through both the life of a shark and through those horrific summer days of 1916 when one of those sharks--for some unknown reason--began to feast on my grandparents' generation in their funny-looking, old-fashioned bathing costumes. In fact, my grandfather, Rex--the guy who would spend hour after hour in the saltwater with me when I was little--grew up in New Jersey and was fourteen, staying at his family's Ocean Grove summer home, when the book's events took place. He was reportedly a little more cautious after the attacks--one of which took the life of teenager Charles Bruder, an oceanside resort's bell captain, just a few miles south of where Rex was swimming that particular day. (To think I might not be here today if that shark's hunger aimed it a little more northward!) "...The shark was adapted to handle the crisis of hunger in ways human beings did not know in 1916, and struggled decades later to understand. As the shark swam, there is evidence the legs and bones of Charles Bruder cut off at the knees and pieces of the bell captain's torso remained preserved in the fish's stomach for later consumption, in the manner of a camel. Gleaming specimens of dolphins and mackerel, fresh as if iced in the fishmonger's window, have been pulled from the stomachs of sharks, as well as still-legible paper documents. But the most compelling proof of the shark's camel-like ability in crisis occurred on April 17, 1935, when Albert Hobston caught a thirteen-foot tiger shark off a Sydney, Australia, beach and towed it alive to the Coogee Aquarium. Eight days later, dying in captivity, the shark regurgitated a bird, a rat, and, eerily visible in a cloud of muck, a human arm--a thick, muscular arm, so well preserved that the forearm was clearly marked with a tattoo of two boxers. On the basis of a photograph of the tattoo, published in a Sydney newspaper, a man identified his brother, James Smith. The arm was preserved so well, it was accepted as evidence that led to the arrest of a man for murdering and dismembering Smith and dumping him at sea." CLOSE TO SHORE is extensively illustrated with maps and newspaper copy from 1916, as well as photographs of the era's resorts, beach attire, and several of the human characters who were involved in this real-life drama. That drama ends with the accidental netting of a shark, who is then beaten to death in hand-to-tooth combat by the two men in the little rowboat behind which the net was being dragged. While today's DNA testing would more conclusively link the body parts found in the shark's stomach to the New Jersey coastal victims, the evidence seems substantial enough to believe it to be the rogue killer who fortunately spared my grandfather, allowing me to exist and to grow up swimming off the Long Island beaches. That I never encountered anything more than little sand sharks has undoubtedly much to do with the zeal of unenlightened generations to eliminate that jagged-toothed link in the marine biological chain as a result of such terrifying events as the shark attacks of 1916. CLOSE TO SHORE is a thriller that will introduce readers to this mysterious creatures of the deep and perhaps spawn a few marine biologists in the process. Richie Partington ...
Rating: Summary: the school journal review of this book is wrong Review: the paperback version is the adult version, seen thsi in the library, skimmed it, and it IS a gripping story combining life in the 1900s, with a killer shark.
Rating: Summary: Where is Reader's Digest When You Need it? Review: There are one or two chapters in the first 200 pages of this book that are actually about the subject matter. Knowing this, the author, on multiple occasions, builds the story as though something of substance is about to happen. Nothing does. This cheap trick is performed several times throughout the book. If you can get past the flowery writing you may enjoy the last 100 pages. I suggest you get this one from the library. There are certainly better books to buy. If you already own it you can practice your skimming skills.
Rating: Summary: Interesting book proving truth is stranger than fiction Review: This book chronicles a spate of deadly shark attacks on the East Coast back in 1916. The attacks sparked such a panic that for a time the news of the killer shark pushed World War I off the front pages of US newspapers. The author does an admirable job of detailing the background of the area and the bloody events that left such an imprint on those who lived during the time. Once again, truth is stranger than fiction for who would have written a fictional book with a shark traveling up a creek and killing a young boy and man? This actually happened in 1916 wave of terror. Read and beware the water....
Rating: Summary: Sign of Jonah Review: This book documents one of the signs of Jonah Jesus talked about that signals the end of the world. It may have been a Great White that Swallowed Jonah. The Bible says it was a great fish. In Capuzzos book the shark swam in a counter clockwise circle like a swastica, signifying "against nature", like the counter clockwise dance of witches. The attacks occured in 5 places like a pentagram over Monmouth county. As German U-boats prowled the atlantic this shark was eating people. It was an omen concerning the rise of German militarism and the end times for the Jews. The final holocaust is almost here. All who do not recieve the mark of the beast, Jew and Gentile, will be on death marches. Thousands already have the mark of the beast voluntarilly. One more bad terrorist attack and I believe it will be mandatory. Those who decline will be persecuted. There is not much time for the Jews to exscape. We gentiles will need the grace to be martyrs. The ferry boat crashing into white hall, Lacy Peterson, the 250 pound harp seal, the dolphins in the shrewsbury river, it is all the sign of Jonah. Now is the time to get close to G-d, or you will end up burning in the lake of fire.
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