Customer Reviews

Shadows in the Sea: The Sharks, Skates and Rays

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Well, what can i say? i LOVE this book. From the first pages, an account of the "rogue shark" off New Jersey in 1916, this book is informative, exciting, and sometimes even endearing...stories of shark fisherman, attacks, and a comprehensive guide to sharks commonly found in North American oceans, i have never read a shark book that is so full of information...READ THIS BOOK!

First published in 1963, Shadows in the Sea has been a popular book about sharks and their relatives, the skates and rays. Thomas Allen tells what he learned from two major contributors to the book. One was Captain William Young, known as "Captain Shark Killer," the other was Mack McCormick, whose shark research is now housed in American Museum of Natural History (New York, USA). According to the author, both men had a deep abiding respect for sharks.

Thomas Allen gives an evenhanded treatment of sharks in Shadows in the Sea. The author divides his subject into four parts: sharks against humans, humans against sharks, sharks as gods or food, and sharks and their relatives as fish. He opens with the famous story of the shark attack in New Jersey in 1916, which formed the basis of the popular Jaws movies. He believes that hunting sharks does not prevent shark attacks. The wrong sharks are usually killed, and the shark population is further depleted. According to Thomas Allen, sharks have a purpose in the ocean ecosystem.

In presenting human-shark history, the author explains the painting by John Singleton Copley, "Brook Watson and the Shark" (1778). The Lord Mayor of London Watson had lost his leg to a shark. Besides including a shark on his family crest, Watson also commissioned Copley to commemorate the event. However, the beast that Copley painted was not a real shark. He imagined the shark as a huge whale possessing a large jaw of sharp teeth. Most European people at that time had little concept of what sharks actually were like.

Thomas Allen recounts how the over-killing of sharks since the 1970s spurred people to save the sharks. In 1991, the Pelagic Shark Research Foundation campaigned against annual shark fishing "derbies" in California.

(Since the "derbies" involved shooting sharks with guns and harpoons, the author refers to them as "massacres".) By 1995, the Foundation was successful in stopping the organized "derbies".

In the last half of the book, the author presents the sharks themselves, and their natural history. He writes, "Whence the Shadows? Aeons before people appeared on earth, the shark was the monarch of the primordial seas. As prehistorical era after era passed---as amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals came forth-the shark remained. The dinosaurs-Brontosaurus, Allosaurus, Triceratops, and a thousand more-stalked the earth in ponderous supremacy and vanished into extinction. But the shark lives on. Millions upon millions of years before the first precursor of man appeared, the shark began a dynasty that has remained unbroken."

In clear language, the author explains shark naming (taxonomy) and shark anatomy. After reading this book, the reader will have a greater appreciation of sharks. Thomas Allen emphasizes that sharks are to be admired and cherished for what they do. Sharks deserve a chance to be saved from extinction.

this is one of the most informative and fascinating books i have ever read. i have used it for giving speeches and for teaching. the illustrations are very interesting along with the other art works included. i must own close to a thousand books , but this is one of the very few which i read over and over.

It's a really nice book that has a lot of documented facts, but is read as a novel. Unfortunately, I left it on a plane. So I am thinking to buy another one.

Although this book is 47 years old, it is quite comprehensive in its coverage of its subject. I purchased the book because it contains an account of an attack from a Great White Shark that my father witnessed when I was a little girl and he is mentioned in the book. I found it through Googling my father's name.

I read this book after years of interest in the Ocean and all things therein. I had thought I read most of the published accounts of the more well-known incidents, especially here in teh U.S. This book taught me so much more was available. This is the best coverage of the New Jersey shark attacks (with photos) just now being covered in greater detail in 2 newly published books. It covers the story of an old shark fisherman, an evolution of our study of sharks and of attacks and biological data. One of the best.