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thehannahwilkinson 's review for:
Jaws
by Peter Benchley
Jaws is very very 70s and very very shit.
An important note at the top… I love sharks, absolutely fucking LOVE them, I’ll watch any bad movie that features them, binge on documentaries during Shark Week and one day want to do a cage-dive with a great white. However, I do not love sharks enough to ever read this book again. That is, in part, because there simply was not enough shark in it!
I’ll start with the good stuff, the descriptions of the shark, the ocean and the boats were all great. As a lifelong water-baby, with a childhood spent sailing on and swimming in the sea, there’s something about a maritime-based book that tugs a little on the sheets (😉) of my heart. It’s obvious Benchley has a love of the ocean and drew on his childhood sea-fishing expeditions to create some really immersive and engaging scenes in and on the water.
However, when the most likeable character in your novel is a 25 foot, 3 tonne killing machine, I’d say you’ve missed the mark somewhat. Chief Brody was boring, judgmental and jealous… with no authority or backbone to speak of and there was no part of me that wanted him to prevail over the shark. Ellen Brody was a dull, snobby housewife whose only ‘interesting’ moments came from an entirely unnecessary affair subplot, in which it became clear that the author must have spent a lot of time at sea and not much time around women. At one point Ellen coquettishly declares to her secret lover that it’s “every schoolgirl’s dream, to be a whore”! Is it Ellen? IS IT THOUGH?! I mean, you do you hun, have your kinks, but I did think that was a little unnecessary over a midweek seafood lunch.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for a little bit of smut, but not in my shark books! I came here for the hardcore fish drama not the soft-core porn!
Honestly I probably put more time and effort into this cover recreation than the author did into this book, this one is a hard no from me.
An important note at the top… I love sharks, absolutely fucking LOVE them, I’ll watch any bad movie that features them, binge on documentaries during Shark Week and one day want to do a cage-dive with a great white. However, I do not love sharks enough to ever read this book again. That is, in part, because there simply was not enough shark in it!
I’ll start with the good stuff, the descriptions of the shark, the ocean and the boats were all great. As a lifelong water-baby, with a childhood spent sailing on and swimming in the sea, there’s something about a maritime-based book that tugs a little on the sheets (😉) of my heart. It’s obvious Benchley has a love of the ocean and drew on his childhood sea-fishing expeditions to create some really immersive and engaging scenes in and on the water.
However, when the most likeable character in your novel is a 25 foot, 3 tonne killing machine, I’d say you’ve missed the mark somewhat. Chief Brody was boring, judgmental and jealous… with no authority or backbone to speak of and there was no part of me that wanted him to prevail over the shark. Ellen Brody was a dull, snobby housewife whose only ‘interesting’ moments came from an entirely unnecessary affair subplot, in which it became clear that the author must have spent a lot of time at sea and not much time around women. At one point Ellen coquettishly declares to her secret lover that it’s “every schoolgirl’s dream, to be a whore”! Is it Ellen? IS IT THOUGH?! I mean, you do you hun, have your kinks, but I did think that was a little unnecessary over a midweek seafood lunch.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for a little bit of smut, but not in my shark books! I came here for the hardcore fish drama not the soft-core porn!
Honestly I probably put more time and effort into this cover recreation than the author did into this book, this one is a hard no from me.