Shadow Divers

I just got a excited call from the wife who's wandering around Costco. Perusing their book section, she stumbled upon a newly published book entitled : "Shadow Divers : The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II". It has a very high reader-rating on Amazon.com. In case you're interested, here's a summary of the story:

This superlative journalistic narrative tells of John Chatterton and Rich Kohler, two deep-sea wreck divers who in 1991 dove to a mysterious wreck lying at the perilous depth of 230 feet, off the coast of New Jersey. Both had a philosophy of excelling and pushing themselves to the limit; both needed all their philosophy and fitness to proceed once they had identified the wreck as a WWII U-boat. As Kurson, a writer for Esquire, narrates in this debut, the two divers next undertook a seven-year search for the U-boat's identity inside the wreck, in a multitude of archives and in a host of human memories. Along the way, Chatterton's diving cost him a marriage, and Kohler's love for his German heritage helped turn him into a serious U-boat scholar. The two lost three of their diving companions on the wreck and their mentor, Bill Nagle, to alcoholism. (Chowdhury's The Last Dive, from HarperPerennial in 2002, covers two of the divers' deaths.) The successful completion of their quest fills in a gap in WWII history-the fate of the Type IX U-boat U-869. Chatterton and Kohler's success satisfied them and a diminishing handful of U-boat survivors. While Kurson doesn't stint on technical detail, lovers of any sort of adventure tale will certainly absorb the author's excellent characterizations, and particularly his balance in describing the combat arm of the Third Reich. Felicitous cooperation between author and subject rings through every page of this rare insightful action narrative. If the publishers are dreaming of another Perfect Storm, they may get their wish.

I picked this book up at Cosco last month as well. Very good read and I enjoyed it. Alot of it was cross over from other books such as Deep Descent and Last Dive. Still worth the read though.

Kaz

Funny that you should mention Shadow Divers, my LDS has just announced that John, one of the shadow divers, will be at next months meeting to discuss the find. Don't have all the details but check out www.bluewaterdivers.com for info if you happen to be in the NY/NJ area and are interested.

Best scuba book I've read. THe author is a writer, not a diver that writes (CHowdhury, horribly written IMHO).

Highly recommend it

Chris

This is a great book, whether you dive or not. I read it a couple of weeks ago during a dive trip to the San Juan Islands.

I was especially impressed with their ethical approach, leaving human remains undisturbed, even though that principle may have prolonged the process of identifying the sub.

Steve

Kevin McMurray also has another book out. "Dark Descent" This is about diving on the Empress of Ireland in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Not as good of a read as Shadow divers but still worth reading. I greatly enjoyed Shadow Divers, and have an appreciation of the enthusiam John Chatterton brings to Deep Sea Detectives. He really does it for the history.