A once-in-a-lifetime chance to cruise the Pacific turns into a deadly nightmare in Jameson's latest fast-paced horror-thriller (after Shark Island). Alex Simmons and Harry Curtis were college pals, but a friend's death drove them apart. Years later, Harry invites Alex on a yachting trip, claiming that all is forgiven. When Harry asks to detour the group to Orchid Atoll-where his father served in the Coast Guard-and no one objects, Alex wonders whether Harry had this planned all along. Once at the atoll, they come face-to-face with cruel pirates and frenzied sharks. Throwing in plenty of characters to facilitate a high body count, Jameson does a fair job of balancing all their emotional backstories with the ever-present gore and violence. At times, introspection bogs down the pace, but sharks lurking in the background pulls the suspenseful story to a satisfying conclusion. This dark, bloody beach read will make readers think twice about getting in the water. Agent: Howard Morhaim, Howard Morhaim Literary. (July) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

A group of friends gets together for a reunion in the Hawaiian Islands. They stumble upon some armed men who are up to no good and who aren't shy about their very strong desire to keep their activities a secret. Oh, and there are sharks: devil sharks, to be precise, who lurk in the water and gobble up anyone unlucky enough to get too close to them. As the body count rises, so does the blood-red tension. A bare-bones description of the plot really doesn't do this exciting thriller justice; the meat of the story is in its characters, in the interplay between the good guys and the bad guys, and in the way the author sells the rather implausible story by anchoring it to events that somehow feel plausible. (There is a perfectly acceptable explanation, for example, about why the sharks and the bad guys and the friends are all together in the same place.) Fans of Peter Benchley's Jaws or Steve Alten's Meg series will enjoy the deft mixture of human drama and shark-driven horror.--Pitt, David Copyright 2010 Booklist