CROCODILE ATTACK

by Hugh Edwards ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 1, 1989

And you thought giant sharks were scary? Just wait until you read about the monster crocs Edwards (The Wreck on the Half-Moon Reef 1973) has lined up in this entertaining look (with a foreword by Crocodile Dundee himself, Paul Horgan) at the largest land carnivore. Not that Edwards serves up his crocs much differently than others have sharks; his opening chapter, a lurid account of a croc killing an American model in Australia in 1987, could have been ripped from the pages of Jaws: ""The crocodile was not so near that [she] could see every detail of the dragon face. . .it looked like the Devil himself. Terror!"" But after so melodramatically pointing up crocs' ferocity,Edwards veers into some unusual territory--beginning with a weird joint biography contrasting the birth, childhood, and young adult life of the dead model and the huge croc that killed her (""By the time Ginger Faye Meadows reached high school and went to her first school dance, the crocodile was taking his place in the world""). A flurry of Australian croc-attack tales follows, including the incredible story of Vat Plumwood, who survived a series of underwater death rolls by a monster croc. And just to balance the scales, Edwards also tells the tale of ""Sweetheart,"" a huge croc whose many attacks on motorboats and outboard motors without ever hurting a human made him a folk legend in Australia. All this anecdotal fare is then weighted by some harder-core data--on the habits and size of crocs (the largest recorded croc in Australia is just over 20 feet) and on how to keep an aggressive croc from attacking (basically, hold your ground and try to ""eyeball it down""). Edwards concludes predictably, with a plea for the intelligent conservation (i.e., regulated farming) of the croc. Edwards' enthusiasm for crocs energizes his study into a slickly engaging middlebrow mix of substance and sensationalism.

Pub Date: July 1, 1989

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Harper & Row

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1989

Categories: NONFICTION