I’ve read a couple of books about the 1916 NJ Shark Attacks, and I absolutely love sharks in general. I’ve even gotten to pet two of them! This particular book felt like more of an introduction to the attacks, which was then followed with info on other attacks, shark conservation, etc.

Although I picked up a new fact or two about the attacks, I spent more time wondering why she skipped over so much of interest in the case. Sure, she offered detailed accounts of the attacks themselves, but there wasn’t much said about the doctor and other heroes involved.

One thing I really didn’t like was that the author repeated herself a lot. Referring back to something earlier in a book is fine, but it’s not necessary to include a full quote for the second or even third time. She also overused the ‘no pun intended/pun intended’ joke.

Something that I found to be highly dubious was the claim that “ethics in the media industry was not what it is today.” The U.S. media has basically zero ethics and places plenty of misleading or false stories. The rare good journalists are often fired, especially with our version of the Mad King in charge.

This was a quick read, which might make it better for those who don’t want to invest too much time on the true story of a shark or sharks that behaved in a way that still defies experts today.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an ARC. This review contains my honest, unbiased opinion.

Overall, I enjoyed this book. I definitely enjoyed the beginning part of the book which talked about the actual 1916 shark attacks and the last chapter which connected it to Jaws more than the rest of the book. The middle section, which talked about the theories behind the attacks and other attacks that happened afterwards, seemed to drag on and I thought about not finishing the book. The last few chapters, although they seemed to talk negatively about Jaws, redeemed the book as it focused on how the attacks could’ve inspired the book and movie adaptation of Jaws. This is not typically the genre I read, but I thought it was very interesting. I would recommend this to people who enjoyed the Jaws movie or books or just had a love of sharks.

This is a non-fiction of real life events that potentially inspired the Jaws book that was later turned into the block buster film. The book clearly stated that Peter Benchly denids that his book was inspired by these events, but there are themes that very similar.

This was a well organized book that brought up a lot of information about sharks and how the culture around them have evolved through the years. It’s well paced and keeps giving you little nuggets to keep the reader interested. If you’re interested in sharks then I highly recommend this book.

Thank you NetGalley and Pen & Sword for allowing me to read this book early. The opinion in this review is my own.

I appreciate that I was provided a copy of the eARC by NetGalley, Pen and Sword and White Owl in exchange for my honest review.

The cover of this book initially caught my attention. I am a Jaws fan and, like many, find sharks incredibly interesting. Once I read the book description I knew I would definitely be reading this.
This book did not disappoint with the writer’s clear and concise discussion of the Shark Attacks in New Jersey in 1916. Occasionally, the author seems to detour to unrelated topics but by the end of each chapter, it gets tied back to the 1916 attacks. This was a very informative and entertaining, although sometimes heartbreaking, read and I would read another book by this author. I really enjoyed how she tied the ending in and gave her readers information and ways to take action after they finish reading.

Did you know that the first known representation of a shark attack is from 725 BCE...? I did not! And did you know that the movie "Jaws"> has some basis in fact—a series of 1916 shark attacks on the New Jersey coast? I did not know that either.

In "The Real Jaws", Perez dives into the history of those shark attacks and, critically, how they impacted the way people viewed sharks. I'm not entirely new to shark research (I once upon a time wrote an essay that was partly about sharks and that referenced some of the same sources she uses, which amuses me), but I wasn't familiar with the 1916 attacks or the other seasons of increased shark activity in various places. I did read the Wikipedia article on the 1916 attacks before I read the book—which I then regretted, because there would have been a bit more suspense for that part of the book if I hadn't known what to expect.

So it's fascinating material. Perez takes to the subject with plenty of enthusiasm (if a few too many exclamation marks) and a lot of research—anyone who likes leaping from a book into the reference section will be satisfied here. The beginning of the book has a timeline, which is full of events (e.g., polio outbreaks, war activities) that I initially thought were just for context but Perez tied neatly into the context of sharks and shark-human encounters. I don't take every conclusion at face value (e.g., Perez says that "even the ISAF [International Shark Attack File] suggests on their website that people actively menstruating should avoid swimming in open water to reduce one's odds of being attacked by a shark" (loc. 1562*), but what the ISAF actually says** is much softer: "If someone is attempting to maximize reduction of risks, staying out of the water during menstruation is one step that can be taken. However, many people safely dive while menstruating, and we have continued to see no obvious pattern of increased shark encounters."), but that's probably smart for most nonfiction; treat one source as one source but not as a definitive source without, erm, consulting other sources.

Writing-wise, this could have used another extensive round of line-level edits. I liked the overall structure (starting with the 1916 attacks and then moving on to theories about what caused so much shark activity, more recent shark-heavy seasons, and of course "Jaws"), but I spent far too long on lines like this one: "This [multiple bites] is outside the standard behavior when a shark mistakenly bites a human. Why did the shark repeatedly bite Bruder when surely it must have known that its victim was indeed a human being?" (loc. 625)

Perez later gets into what science now thinks about sharks—among other things, that they use biting to examine unknown things (they don't exactly have fingers to do the same job!)—but I was stuck on the fact that even if a shark bit somebody once and realized in doing so that it wasn't a seal, it wouldn't know the thing was specifically human; most likely it would just know that the thing it had bitten was living but not a seal or fish or whatever. Given that Perez also notes that violent language (attack, bite, deadly, etc.; e.g., loc. 2168) has widely been used to describe sharks and their interactions with humans, and that such language contributes to a public view of sharks as monsters, I also would have liked to see her use quite a bit less of the same language (my Kindle counts some 718 uses of the word "attack", though I should note that this includes the references, the table of contents, etc.).

All of this said: I learned a lot, and I came home from work with my nose buried in my Kindle and said absentmindedly to my partner, "Can we watch 'Jaws'?" (and then went back to my book). An engaging read if you want to learn a bit about a forgotten (and gory) part of history, or if you need a shark week read.

Thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy through NetGalley.

*Quotes are from an ARC and may not be final.
** https://web.archive.org/web/20250515001155/https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/shark-attacks/reduce-risk/menstruation/

I received a copy for review. All opinions are my own. Most all of us have an innate fear or sharks but we don’t even understand what causes that in the big picture. This book was so informative and really taught me the history of shark attacks, our fear of them, and how humans have misunderstood sharks since the dawn of time. This gives me a far greater appreciation of the species as a whole.