List Price: $17.00 Details

Save: $2.01 (12%)

Get Fast, Free Shipping with Amazon Prime FREE Returns

FREE delivery Wednesday, February 1 if you spend $25 on items shipped by Amazon

Or fastest delivery Tuesday, January 31. Order within 8 hrs 37 mins

In Stock.

[{"displayPrice":"$14.99","priceAmount":14.99,"currencySymbol":"$","integerValue":"14","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"99","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"YthjDcFs6txNGftN4CdDB9PjaeUkuPgZ73vGRVABKlQjo%2FfPJxCsK3iVH%2FDRgggXzWWnkzRGIEIqk9fe%2F4uNIAUa%2FbpzfckKlPSfC1rEZIFFv67qQElV6SL5Bbfni8brfIBCsG6rAZA0YKak%2BOL10Q%3D%3D","locale":"en-US","buyingOptionType":"NEW"},{"displayPrice":"$10.98","priceAmount":10.98,"currencySymbol":"$","integerValue":"10","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"98","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"mfglyJt%2BKU5GjLULjMm%2FeWTqzxI5V6Y6%2Fj183m9F2430DtY82VaFYBz%2FraIN1%2Fzc6j%2FZEAcW%2Bb3RRvL7NN8a%2Bk%2BzNLDcUZ%2FJDVZGWD0TkEIHF3KS5m%2FlgFtDAxHQoicDzqZaXFs8W8kEl%2FKuSI%2FwPVnknMa5PcJHKG7tPrRaI3rlEXQ7QKbcnJr8tcKYsL3G","locale":"en-US","buyingOptionType":"USED"}]

$$14.99 () Includes selected options. Includes initial monthly payment and selected options. Details

Secure transaction

Ships from

Amazon.com

Sold by

Amazon.com

Details

Ships from

Amazon.com

Sold by

Amazon.com

Return policy: Eligible for Return, Refund or Replacement within 30 days of receipt

Add a gift receipt for easy returns

Get Fast, Free Shipping with Amazon Prime

FREE delivery Friday, February 3 if you spend $25 on items shipped by Amazon

Select delivery location

Used: Acceptable | Details

Sold by Murfbooks

Fulfilled by Amazon

Access codes and supplements are not guaranteed with used items.

Have one to sell?

Sell on Amazon

Other Sellers on Amazon

Added

Not added

$16.20
& FREE Shipping

Sold by: MyPrepbooks

Added

Not added

$17.94
& FREE Shipping

Sold by: Book Depository US

Added

Not added

$14.35
+ $3.99 shipping

Sold by: allnewbooks

Flip to back Flip to front

Listen Playing... Paused You're listening to a sample of the Audible audio edition.
Learn more

See this image

Follow the Author

Peter Benchley

Jaws: A Novel Paperback – August 6, 2013

by Peter Benchley (Author)

4,132 ratings

Book 1 of 1: Jaws

See all formats and editions

Price

New from

Used from

Kindle

"Please retry"

$10.99

—

Audible Audiobook, Unabridged

"Please retry"

$0.00

Free with your Audible trial

Hardcover

"Please retry"

$27.00

$17.79

$16.57

Paperback

"Please retry"

$14.99

$11.59

$4.31

Mass Market Paperback

"Please retry"

$14.95

—

$4.39

Audio CD, Audiobook

"Please retry"

$23.72

$19.46

$8.31

Enhance your purchase

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The classic suspense novel of shark versus man, which was made into the blockbuster Steven Spielberg movie. The Jaws phenomenon changed popular culture and continues to inspire a growing interest in sharks and the oceans today.

When Peter Benchley wrote Jaws in the early 1970s, he meticulously researched all available data about shark behavior. Over the ensuing decades, Benchley was actively engaged with scientists and filmmakers on expeditions around the world as they expanded their knowledge of sharks. Also during this time, there was an unprecedented upswing in the number of sharks killed to make shark-fin soup, and Benchley worked with governments and nonprofits to sound the alarm for shark conservation. He encouraged each new generation of Jaws fans to enjoy his riveting tale and to channel their excitement into support and protection of these magnificent, prehistoric apex predators.

This edition of Jaws contains bonus content from Peter Benchley’s archives, including the original typed title page, a brainstorming list of possible titles, a letter from Benchley to producer David Brown with honest feedback on the movie adaptation, and excerpts from Benchley’s book Shark Trouble highlighting his firsthand account of writing Jaws, selling it to Universal Studios, and working with Steven Spielberg.

Praise for Jaws

“A tightly written, tautly paced study of terror [that] makes us tingle.”—The Washington Post

“Powerful . . . [Benchley’s] story grabs you at once.”—The New York Times Book Review

“Relentless terror . . . You’d better steel yourself for this one. It isn’t a tale for the faint of heart.”—The Philadelphia Inquirer

“Pure engrossment from the very opening . . . a fine story told with style, class, and a splendid feeling for suspense.”—Chicago Sun-Times

Print length

352 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Ballantine Books
Publication date

August 6, 2013
Dimensions

5.2 x 0.84 x 7.98 inches
ISBN-10

0345544145
ISBN-13

978-0345544148
See all details

Frequently bought together

+
+

Total price:

To see our price, add these items to your cart.

Choose items to buy together.

by Peter Benchley Paperback
$14.99
In Stock.
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
Get it as soon as Wednesday, Feb 1
by Michael Crichton Mass Market Paperback
$8.99
In Stock.
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
Get it as soon as Wednesday, Feb 1
by Michael Crichton Mass Market Paperback
$8.59
In Stock.
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
Get it as soon as Wednesday, Feb 1

Michael Crichton
14,361
Mass Market Paperback
104 offers from $2.25
Michael Crichton
7,301
Mass Market Paperback
96 offers from $2.14
Mitsukobayashi
101
Paperback
2 offers from $3.99
Carl Gottlieb
708
Paperback
53 offers from $8.15
Peter Benchley
146
Hardcover
179 offers from $1.18
Sandra Kahn
292
Hardcover
in General
25 offers from $17.28

Popular Highlights in this book

What are popular highlights?

Intellectually, they knew a great deal. Practically, they chose to know almost nothing.
Highlighted by 193 Kindle readers
Sharks are like ax-murderers, Martin. People react to them with their guts. There’s something crazy and evil and uncontrollable about them.
Highlighted by 135 Kindle readers
The great fish moved silently through the night water, propelled by short sweeps of its crescent tail.
Highlighted by 124 Kindle readers

Editorial Reviews

Review

“A tightly written, tautly paced study of terror [that] makes us tingle.”—The Washington Post

“Powerful . . . [Benchley’s] story grabs you at once.”—The New York Times Book Review

“Relentless terror . . . You’d better steel yourself for this one. It isn’t a tale for the faint of heart.”—The Philadelphia Inquirer

“Pure engrossment from the very opening . . . a fine story told with style, class, and a splendid feeling for suspense.”—Chicago Sun-Times

About the Author

Peter Benchley began his career as a novelist in 1974 with the publication of Jaws, which was made into a hugely successful film. His other books include The Deep, The Island, The Girl of the Sea of Cortez, “Q” Clearance, Rummies, Beast, White Shark, and Shark Trouble. He was also a speechwriter for President Lyndon Johnson and a journalist for such magazines as Newsweek and National Geographic. Benchley died in 2006. For more information, please visit www.peterbenchley.com.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

1

The great fish moved silently through the night water, propelled by short sweeps of its crescent tail. The mouth was open just enough to permit a rush of water over the gills. There was little other motion: an occasional correction of the apparently aimless course by the slight raising or lowering of a pectoral fin—as a bird changes direction by dipping one wing and lifting the other. The eyes were sightless in the black, and the other senses transmitted nothing extraordinary to the small, primitive brain. The fish might have been asleep, save for the movement dictated by countless millions of years of instinctive continuity: lacking the flotation bladder common to other fish and the fluttering flaps to push oxygen-bearing water through its gills, it survived only by moving. Once stopped, it would sink to the bottom and die of anoxia.

The land seemed almost as dark as the water, for there was no moon. All that separated sea from shore was a long, straight stretch of beach—so white that it shone. From a house behind the grass-splotched dunes, lights cast yellow glimmers on the sand.

The front door to the house opened, and a man and a woman stepped out onto the wooden porch. They stood for a moment staring at the sea, embraced quickly, and scampered down the few steps onto the sand. The man was drunk, and he stumbled on the bottom step. The woman laughed and took his hand, and together they ran to the beach.

“First a swim,” said the woman, “to clear your head.”

“Forget my head,” said the man. Giggling, he fell backward onto the sand, pulling the woman down with him. They fumbled with each other’s clothing, twined limbs around limbs, and thrashed with urgent ardor on the cold sand.

Afterward, the man lay back and closed his eyes. The woman looked at him and smiled. “Now, how about that swim?” she said.

“You go ahead. I’ll wait for you here.”

The woman rose and walked to where the gentle surf washed over her ankles. The water was colder than the night air, for it was only mid-June. The woman called back, “You’re sure you don’t want to come?” But there was no answer from the sleeping man.

She backed up a few steps, then ran at the water. At first her strides were long and graceful, but then a small wave crashed into her knees. She faltered, regained her footing, and flung herself over the next waist-high wave. The water was only up to her hips, so she stood, pushed the hair out of her eyes, and continued walking until the water covered her shoulders. There she began to swim—with the jerky, head-above-water stroke of the untutored.

A hundred yards offshore, the fish sensed a change in the sea’s rhythm. It did not see the woman, nor yet did it smell her. Running within the length of its body were a series of thin canals, filled with mucus and dotted with nerve endings, and these nerves detected vibrations and signaled the brain. The fish turned toward shore.

The woman continued to swim away from the beach, stopping now and then to check her position by the lights shining from the house. The tide was slack, so she had not moved up or down the beach. But she was tiring, so she rested for a moment, treading water, and then started for shore.

The vibrations were stronger now, and the fish recognized prey. The sweeps of its tail quickened, thrusting the giant body forward with a speed that agitated the tiny phosphorescent animals in the water and caused them to glow, casting a mantle of sparks over the fish.

The fish closed on the woman and hurtled past, a dozen feet to the side and six feet below the surface. The woman felt only a wave of pressure that seemed to lift her up in the water and ease her down again. She stopped swimming and held her breath. Feeling nothing further, she resumed her lurching stroke.

The fish smelled her now, and the vibrations—erratic and sharp—signaled distress. The fish began to circle close to the surface. Its dorsal fin broke water, and its tail, thrashing back and forth, cut the glassy surface with a hiss. A series of tremors shook its body.

For the first time, the woman felt fear, though she did not know why. Adrenaline shot through her trunk and her limbs, generating a tingling heat and urging her to swim faster. She guessed that she was fifty yards from shore. She could see the line of white foam where the waves broke on the beach. She saw the lights in the house, and for a comforting moment she thought she saw someone pass by one of the windows.

The fish was about forty feet from the woman, off to the side, when it turned suddenly to the left, dropped entirely below the surface, and, with two quick thrusts of its tail, was upon her.

At first, the woman thought she had snagged her leg on a rock or a piece of floating wood. There was no initial pain, only one violent tug on her right leg. She reached down to touch her foot, treading water with her left leg to keep her head up, feeling in the blackness with her left hand. She could not find her foot. She reached higher on her leg, and then she was overcome by a rush of nausea and dizziness. Her groping fingers had found a nub of bone and tattered flesh. She knew that the warm, pulsing flow over her fingers in the chill water was her own blood.

Pain and panic struck together. The woman threw her head back and screamed a guttural cry of terror.

The fish had moved away. It swallowed the woman’s limb without chewing. Bones and meat passed down the massive gullet in a single spasm. Now the fish turned again, homing on the stream of blood flushing from the woman’s femoral artery, a beacon as clear and true as a lighthouse on a cloudless night. This time the fish attacked from below. It hurtled up under the woman, jaws agape. The great conical head struck her like a locomotive, knocking her up out of the water. The jaws snapped shut around her torso, crushing bones and flesh and organs into a jelly. The fish, with the woman’s body in its mouth, smashed down on the water with a thunderous splash, spewing foam and blood and phosphorescence in a gaudy shower.

Below the surface, the fish shook its head from side to side, its serrated triangular teeth sawing through what little sinew still resisted. The corpse fell apart. The fish swallowed, then turned to continue feeding. Its brain still registered the signals of nearby prey. The water was laced with blood and shreds of flesh, and the fish could not sort signal from substance. It cut back and forth through the dissipating cloud of blood, opening and closing its mouth, seining for a random morsel. But by now, most of the pieces of the corpse had dispersed. A few sank slowly, coming to rest on the sandy bottom, where they moved lazily in the current. A few drifted away just below the surface, floating in the surge that ended in the surf.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Ballantine Books; Reprint edition (August 6, 2013)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 352 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0345544145
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0345544148
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 9.6 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.2 x 0.84 x 7.98 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #28,016 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #870 in Thriller & Suspense Action Fiction
- #1,354 in Psychological Thrillers (Books)
- #4,112 in Suspense Thrillers

Customer Reviews:
4,132 ratings

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Videos

Help others learn more about this product by uploading a video!

Upload your video

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.

Peter Benchley

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read author blogs and more

Customer reviews

4.6 out of 5

4,132 global ratings

5 star		74%
4 star		14%
3 star		8%
2 star		2%
1 star		2%

How customer reviews and ratings work

Reviews with images

See all customer images

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Ricardo Gutierrez

GREAT

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on November 26, 2022

Verified Purchase

The original Jaws novel was a great novel and I highly recommend. I like the film as well. FUN TIME!

One person found this helpful

Helpful

Schuyler V. Johnson

Great because it was the first, the original

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on July 23, 2003

Verified Purchase

I loved "Jaws" when I first read it, because it broke new literary ground and it terrified me to think what could be deep in the ocean where I swam so often. Subsequent readings have disappointed, somewhat, and I gloss over the tawdry relationship between Hooper and Ellen Brody; which has nothing to do with the story and rather cheapens the book, IMHO. The SHARK is what we want to read about; HIS effect on this tiny community, and his fateful encounters with various unfortunates. The reader who first received "Jaws" as part of his daily assignment was fired on the spot when he dismissed the book with the comment: "Who wants to see a movie about sharks?" He was blackballed, quietly, and is now most likely selling vacuum cleaners door to door. The more astute reader who brought this to the studio's attention deserves rich praise indeed, because this was a blockbuster and continues to be, on screen. Not to denigrate the book too much, the shark encounters are fantastic, and the descriptions of the attacks are fabulous, and you really feel for the poor people trapped in the territory of the unseen monster...From the first chapter and the first attack, you are mesmerized, and on the run with Brody, Hooper and Quint (based on the real life shark hunter, Frank Mundus, who landed the largest Great White ever caught on line; 17 feet in length and almost 4000 pounds!!!!)
The REAL Quint:
"Frank Mundus, born in Brooklyn, NY in 1925, is the most famous shark fisherman of all time. Since taking his boat CRICKET II on it's maiden voyage in 1947, Capt. Mundus has caught some of the largest great white sharks on record. He pioneered the sport of sharkfishing and was the innovator of many of the fishing techniques used today. Although Peter Benchley has never publicly acknowledged him, it is generally known that he was the inspiration for the character "Quint". Much of the action in JAWS is based on Capt. Mundus' real-life experiences.
In 1961 Capt. Mundus caught a 3,000lb great white off the bathing beach of Amagansett (Amity?), NY. The following year he caught a larger great white off Block Island. His greatest claim to fame came in 1964 when, after a 5 hour struggle, he captured a 17 1/2', 4,500lb great white 10 miles off Montauk, Long Island. The shark required 5 harpoons, each attached to a beer barrel by a 400' rope, before it could be towed to shore. Benchley refers to this incident during his interview on the 20th anniversary edition of JAWS, but doesn't mention Capt. Mundus by name. In 1986 Capt. Mundus and Capt. Donnie Braddick caught the largest fish ever taken on rod and reel, a 17', 3,427lb great white. Capt. Braddick was the angler, while Capt. Mundus baited the shark, drove the boat, and supervised the capture of the shark."
The book, being the prelude to a whole new genre of shark books, and caused a simultaneous "shark ephiphany" world-wide, is the forerunner of such books since it's publication, and how glad I am it was published!
Well worth reading, if you haven't (how come you haven't?) yet had the expereince, and you can still enjoy it and be frightened by it even if you've only seen the movie...

30 people found this helpful

Helpful

Jerome R. van West

I. so different from the movie!

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on August 24, 2022

Verified Purchase

I so enjoyed reading this novel. I got immense enjoyment reading this. It’s like something so completely different from the movie, it’s like experiencing a brand new story with a similar theme. I’d love to see a revised movie that’s more closer aligned to the book with modern technology and CGI advancements avail. But maybe that would detract from the original. Anyways, this was fun to read.

2 people found this helpful

Helpful

TechJunkie

good read for many of us to revisit

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on August 16, 2022

Verified Purchase

The left handed compliment that I can give this book is that its opening chapter is the best introduction to any fiction book I have ever read. The rest of the book as well done and well paced but it’s not among the greatest action books I’ve ever read. The subject of the book of course in sustains the interest from beginning to end.

2 people found this helpful

Helpful

Summer Rain

3 Stars

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on January 15, 2023

Verified Purchase

The infamous great white killer- a classic of animal thrillers- gave me pause when I started to read it. “Jaws” was a movie I loved as a kid, and I set forth to finally delve into the source material, the book that started at all. I have to give a big kudos to author Peter Benchley, who thoroughly admitted to having not known enough about sharks when he wrote Jaws. He painted his own story, facts be damned, in a time where little was known about sharks- but he, as an author, owned up to his misinformative novel and proceeded to spend his life campaigning for the correct facts of sharks, as well as doing a ton of work for ocean conservation. I hold a great deal of respect for Mr. Benchley, giving me all the more reason to dive into his book.
I quickly found the major plot differences between the book and the famous movie. The characters in the movie are rather one dimensional- led by simple greed. Where, in the book, there are whole plots you completely will miss out on! Daring mafia threats, emotional family outbursts, sordid love affairs- Jaws really does a great job of utilizing its side characters. It dives deeply into the mindsets and ambitions of those involved in the shark attacks of Amity’s waters, from Hooper’s fascination with sharks to Quint’s money schemes, and most of all, those of Martin Brody, the main character. Between battling his jealous suspicions of his wife’s affair and trying to keep Amity safe with his unpopular decision to keep the beaches closed, he struggles to keep his head above the water. When you compare the movie to the book, the movie is lackluster in comparison, using all of the cool visuals but very little of the actual story.
However, I did give Jaws a 3, which for me is average. Reading it was merely an okay experience for me, personally. It had some good moments, some bits of great description, but it overall didn’t wow me. It’s a good read, but it’s one you really have to read, and I feel like those with a background in fishing or boating might find more gems of interest here. The most interesting part of the book to me was the love affair of Brody’s wife, and their relationship, and if it hadn’t been for that, I’m not sure I would have rated it as highly as I did.

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on February 26, 2022

Verified Purchase

I don't know how many times i've seen Jaws the movie but at least each 5th year and i read the novel as a teen in the 1987, after watching the movie just again just some weeks ago i desided to read the book again and still love it, there is something about this monster and the story that hits a nerve, i love sharks and watch every documentary i can get my hands on and shark week is a must every year. There are actually some twists and changes in the movie i like better than the book, it dosent include the mob, Ellen cheating on Martin and the interaction between the caracters is actually better on the big screen but the book is still a classic and a must read

One person found this helpful

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

KoffinCass

Crush it like Quint.....

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on May 6, 2021

Verified Purchase

I'm a huge jaws fan, seen the movie easily a 1000 times, I've got tons of jaws memorabilia, my body is covered in a few jaws tattoos and I own it on VHS, dvd, bluray and 4k. It's my all time favourite movie. But ive never read the book. I've heard about all the differences between the book and film on YouTube videos and really never liked the sound of the book, so I was put off from reading. But I took the plunge and I've finally given it a shot. And...

It's really good, in its own right. Is it better than the movie, nooooo. The movie is way better than the book, however the book is still an enjoyable read. It does play a little like the film but also with a few differences. The intro and first few victims are roughly the same. B characters in the movie have bigger roles to play in the book such as Harry the reporter and Hendricks the police deputy. Quint really isn't in the book till really the end part of the book. Which leads me into what I didn't like about the book.

At the beginning of the book it has its shark attacks and politics but then midway through it turns into a exotic thriller with Ellen (Brodys wife) and hooper and their affair. It's needlessly gross in detail to the point I was like when will this part of the story end. Its an uncomfortable read. The book really doesn't paint hooper in a good light. He's an awful character.

Also the whole part of the quint, brody and hooper hunting the shark on the orca, in the film is large part of the story, here is basiclly a chapter. Quint and Bruce the sharks demise is literally over in a page and half. I had to re-read it twice to understand what was going on. It all just ends suddenly, which was dissapointing.

The film is so much better than the book however, I couldn't put this book down. I did genuinely read it in one sitting, it took me roughly 6-7 hours to finish. But once i started I couldn't stop reading, even though the mid section of the book is pretty bad. Learning more about the characters and their motivations was great.

If your a jaws megafan I would recommend it just to see the orignal work the movie is based on. But this is case of the movie is far better than the book.

Another note: I ordered this book from amazon in brand new condition. The book arrived in a terrible state, the front cover was creased to wear it looks awful. If I could be bothered I would of returned to amazon. It did not look like a new copy.

13 people found this helpful

Robert Craven

Still after 50 years a great read - better than the movie

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on September 9, 2021

Verified Purchase

There is much of a mythology around Benchley's novel as the movie JAWS. It took nearly 9 years to write and parts of the book you can tell were taken off him and given to other editors. I'd love to see the original manuscript submitted before it was tailored to the mass market.

That said, for a book that's nearly 50 years old, it has an incredible impact.
The set pieces including the final voyage of The Orca are tightly paced and written. But there are moments too where it loses its shape; Ellen Brody, had the potential to become a great literary creation, but her complexity is ruined with 'sexed up' scenes that jar the narrative and reduce her to a cipher. And tag on a cliched crisis between Hooper and her husband, Martin.

The Great White is the star of the show and Benchley brings terror to the page with sharp, snappy writing.

still a great read & I'm glad I rediscovered it. Its part noir, soap opera, and horror. But its hard to feel any sympathy for the principal characters.

10 people found this helpful

Christopher Hood

Not a book of the movie

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on December 27, 2021

Verified Purchase

“Jaws” is my favourite movie. I have probably watched it well over 100 times – most recently only last week. But, I had never read the original novel until this week when I received it as a present.

I have to admit that I went into reading the book with low expectations. I knew that the book is quite different to the movie – the movie used elements of the book as inspiration. This is not a book of the movie (as sometimes happens when someone goes back and novelises the movie – I have read such books before for “Robocop” and one of the James Bond films (I think), for example). Why nobody has given “Jaws” this treatment I don’t know as I’m pretty sure it would sell millions. Just as the original book has done. And rightly so.

Another reason for my low expectations is that it is said that the “Jaws” book is one of the examples if where the movie IS better than the book, while the common belief is that the opposite is usually true for most movie adaptations of books. This is something that has been discussed also on the Jaws For A Minute podcast that I have been listening to.

But, I enjoyed the book. Perhaps it helps that I read a weak book (in my view) recently, so anything better than that was going to seem good. Perhaps it’s just that I’m such a Jaws fan that I was always going to find something that I like about it.

Yes, this book is not the book of the movie. Yes, I prefer the movie. But, if you judge the book on its own merits, it’s not a bad book – bad books don’t get turned into movies (as far as I know). Do I like the book’s versions of Brody, Hooper, and Quint? No. But treating them as different people from the movie who just happen to share the same names, I could get past that issue and enjoy the story for what it was.

I enjoyed seeing what elements of the book remained in the movie – with certain scenes or lines remaining (not always said by the same person) or clearly influencing other elements of the movie. There were even some aspects of the book which I think should have been included in the movie (the best example being what happens to the barrels at one point). But, without a doubt, there were many elements from the movie that I missed – particularly the lack of Quint’s connection to sharks via the Indianapolis. It makes you wonder where some of the additional storylines came from. I’m glad that the movie is much more about the three characters and not the shark and we get to learn more about them on screen and that they are so different to the novel. I’m also glad that the movie had a much better, clearer ending than the book which just seemed too rushed and odd.

As much as I could, I tried to judge the book on the basis of when it was written, rather than the world now – there is language and comments in there which most publishers probably would not allow these days & some of what is there probably wasn’t ever necessary. However, overall, I enjoyed it. I will read it again one day. But I won’t read it as often as I re-watch the movie (as quick and easy as it was to read). The book’s greatest contribution is not to the literary world, but rather what it helped to create in the form of the movie.

4 people found this helpful

The booktrail

BookTrail it to the movies!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on June 1, 2020

Verified Purchase

Oh I've watched Jaws the movie so many times I've lost count. I thought I'd read the book to see how it had been adapted and to see what was different, better etc. Well the ending is certainly different! There's so much extra detail of course in the book and more description but it was clear to see just how clever the film was for its time.

The island is described so well and in such lucious detail that I am half tempted to live by the sea despite the risk of sharks. The nature of the first shark attack in the book is shocking as are the ones which follow and the book really does keep up an excellent sense of fear and foreboding. Having read this so long after the film though, I swear I could hear that der dum der dum every time the shark was about to appear.

I really recommend reading the book even if you think you know the story very well. There's a lot more to the story than just the shark here such as more drama when they have to close the beaches and...wait for it...the issue with Brody's wife! Ah I'm going to look her a little differently now.

That shark steals the show though and I'm going to take this movie/book/booktrail thing one step further now and read it next time I go to the beach...

6 people found this helpful

Teri Gardner

More than the movie

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on February 6, 2022

Verified Purchase

I saw the film ages ago and I know it's suppose to be a classic but I didn't enjoy at all.
I personally think book is so much better.

A quick read with a great spectrum of characters, small-town politics and a great bloody introduction. I feel like the corruption of the mayor, the fact Mayor Larry Vaughan is in with the mob. This explains why he wants the beaches open so much which isn't explained in the film.

The middle section of the book wasn't as captivating as the start and end. The denial of the society more worried about money than the safety of people, the rest was quite boring. I found the Sheriff Brodys wife's affair more annoying, she's so selfish and it didn't really have any connection to the overall plot except that it distracts the Sheriff. I loved the fact all the characters have depth and back story but the affair just made her and Hooper unlikeable characters who are in for their own means.

The last section of the book was full of action of them trying to capture the shark. The description of the shark attacks I thought were quite graphic and detailed. I actually thought it was scarier than the film, but I will say it was scary just graphic.

I think the way the shark dies is better, it's more realistic and not over the top like the film.

2 people found this helpful

See all reviews

Buy new: $14.99$14.99 FREE delivery: Wednesday, Feb 1 on orders over $25.00 shipped by Amazon. Ships from: Amazon.com Sold by: Amazon.com

Buy used: $10.98

Other Sellers on Amazon

Follow the Author

Jaws: A Novel Paperback – August 6, 2013

Enhance your purchase

Frequently bought together

Customers who viewed this item also viewed

Editorial Reviews

Review

About the Author

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Product details

Videos

About the author

Peter Benchley

Customer reviews

Reviews with images

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Top reviews from other countries

Buy new:

$14.99

FREE delivery: Wednesday, Feb 1 on orders over $25.00 shipped by Amazon.

Ships from: Amazon.com

Sold by: Amazon.com

Buy used:

$10.98