The Wave: In Pursuit of the Rogues, Freaks, and Giants of the Ocean

by Susan Casey

An astonishing book about colossal, ship-swallowing rogue waves and the surfers who seek them out

For centuries mariners have spun tales of gargantuan waves—100-feet high or taller. Until recently scientists dis­missed these stories, believing waves that high violate the laws of physics. But in the past few decades, as a startling number of ships have vanished and new evidence has emerged, oceanographers realized something scary is brewing in the planet’s waters. They found their proof in February 2000, when a British research vessel was trapped in a vortex of impossibly mammoth waves in the North Sea—including several that approached 100 feet.

As scientists scramble to understand this phenomenon, others view the giant waves as the ultimate challenge. These are extreme surfers who fly around the world trying to ride the ocean’s most destructive monsters. The pioneer of extreme surfing is the legendary Laird Hamilton, who, with a group of friends in Hawaii, figured out how to board suicidally large waves of 70 and 80 feet. Casey follows this unique tribe of peo­ple as they seek to conquer the holy grail of their sport: a 100­-foot wave.

In this mesmerizing account, the exploits of Hamilton and his fellow surfers are juxtaposed with scientists’ urgent efforts to understand the destructive power of waves, from the tsunami that wiped out 250,000 people in the Pacific in 2004 to the 1,740-foot-wave that leveled part of the Alaskan coast. Like Jon Krakauer’s Into Thin Air, The Wave brilliantly portrays human beings confronting nature at its most ferocious.

Genres: Nonfiction, Science, Nature, Adventure, Sports, Travel, Audiobook

434 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 14, 2010

About the author

Susan Casey is the author of the “The Wave: In Pursuit of the Rogues, Freaks, and Giants of the Ocean,” and “The Devil’s Teeth: A True Story of Obsession and Survival Among America’s Great White Sharks.” Both books are New York Times bestsellers, with “The Wave” named one of 2010’s Most Notable Books. Her latest book, “Voices in the Ocean: A Journey Into the Wild and Haunting World of Dolphins,” was published by Knopf Doubleday in August 2015, and became a New York Times bestseller in its first week on sale. Voices was also chosen as one of Amazon’s Best Books of 2016.

“The Devil’s Teeth” was also a San Francisco Chronicle bestseller, a San Francisco Public Library Book Club Selection, a BookSense bestseller, a Barnes & Noble Discover Selection, a Library Journal Best Book of 2005, a 2005 NPR Summer Reading Selection, and a Hudson News Best Book of 2006. Outside magazine included it in “The New Adventure Library: The 32 Best of the 21st Century’s Books, Movies, and Videos.” Apple featured The Devil’s Teeth on its list of ten “iEssentials” in the Adventure and Travel category.

“The Wave” was also a Hudson News Best Book for 2010, an Indies Choice Award winner, and was featured on dozens of bestseller and critics’ best of the year lists. It won the North American Society for Oceanic History’s John Lyman Book Prize for Science and Technology, and an Indies’ Choice Award in 2011. Mens Journal named it one of “The 50 Greatest Adventure Books” of all time.

From 2009–2013, Casey served as the editor in chief of O, The Oprah Magazine. The publication is one of the country’s largest, with a monthly readership of 15 million women. In 2012, O won the National Magazine Award for General Excellence and the Clarion Award for Best Overall Magazine; during Casey’s tenure the title also garnered numerous other accolades and awards. Along with editing the magazine, Casey contributed to O as a writer, with features that included an odyssey into the world of spiritual healing, and a global scavenger hunt to discover nature’s most powerful superfoods.

In the course of reporting, Casey has lived among great white sharks, faced 70-foot waves off Maui’s north shore, ventured into the heart of the Gulf oil spill, trained as a sharpshooter, and performed as a mermaid in a giant tank, among other adventures. In 2008, she won a National Magazine Award for her Esquire feature, “75,” an investigation of what aging really means, as examined through the life of one exceptional man. In 2006, she received a National Magazine Award nomination for her story, “Our Oceans Are Turning to Plastic…Are You?” an environmental exposé on the dire impact plastic pollution in the oceans is having on planetary and human health. Her writing has appeared in Esquire, National Geographic, Fortune, Time, and Sports Illustrated, as well as the anthologies: “The Best American Science and Nature Writing,” “The Best American Sports Writing,” and “The Best American Magazine Writing.”

From 2000 to 2009, Casey was the development editor of Time Inc; the editor in chief of Sports Illustrated Women; and an editor at large for Time Inc.’s magazine titles. From 1994–1999, she was the creative director of Outside magazine, where she was part of the editorial team that published the original stories behind the bestselling books “Into Thin Air,” and “The Perfect Storm,” as well as the movie “Blue Crush.” During her tenure, Outside won three consecutive, history-making National Magazine Awards for General Excellence. Casey is the only person to have won this prize in all three disciplines: editing, writing, and art direction.

Casey has made frequent TV and radio appearances, including “The Oprah Winfrey Show,” “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart,” “Charlie Rose,” “Conan,” “Anderson Cooper 360,” “Nightline,” “Good Morning America,” “Today,” “The CBS Morning Show,” as well as many NPR outlets including Fresh Air, The Takeaway, and Life on Earth.

Casey lives in New York and

Reviews

[Nicholas Sparks · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a book about ocean waves, and I can already hear what some people might be thinking: Why on earth would I care about that? I had the same thought when I first picked it up; hours later, after reading the book in a single sitting, I realized that good writers can make any story interesting, fascinating, engaging and a lot of fun. Susan Casey is a wonderful writer and the subject only grows more interesting the further you read. While I'm the first to admit that I enjoy a good novel, I also enjoy non-fiction titles, and this one is a 'Don't Miss.'

[Caroline · Rating 4 out of 5]

The closest one can get to gigantic waves without going near water is to read Susan Casey’s The Wave, which looks at rogue waves (and tsunamis, to a lesser extent) and highlights the extreme surfers who pursue them. Casey got into the thick of it, interviewing experts, as good investigative journalists do, but also shadowing Laird Hamilton to learn what makes him tick. A former competitive swimmer with some surfing experience, Casey didn’t hesitate to enter the water, at one point riding with Hamilton on his Jet Ski during a (tamer but still challenging) day of surfing. Some curiosity about waves is necessary to appreciate her book, but it’s a testament to the high quality of her storytelling and descriptive skills that curiosity about Hamilton and surfing isn’t necessary.

As anyone who’s heard of tsunamis and rogue waves knows, they can reach staggering, terrifying heights. Terror lies behind too: They’re backed by a very deep trough, guaranteeing a steep plummet for whatever is caught in them. It’s not uncommon for huge waves to hit in a series, as during stormy weather. For extreme surfers who fail to successfully surf one, a series is extremely dangerous, as the waves that follow break on top of fallen surfers over and over, pinning them underwater for an agonizingly long time. The behavior of the largest waves is freakish. They suspend. As one expert says, if a tsunami is one hundred feet, it’s one hundred feet for five minutes. In a moment that left her awed, Casey saw the biggest wave she’d ever seen and was spellbound by its movement, describing it as taking a long time to crest, advancing like a gliding, undulating wall.

The shock and awe of such occurrences grab attention, but interestingly, a rogue wave doesn’t have to be huge. A wave is rogue if it’s bigger relative to the waves around it. For example, a three-footer in a series of one-footers is a rogue wave. Scientists have discovered that rogues happen all the time, wherever there are waves. So rogues can also be found in sound waves, microwaves, radio waves, and so on.

These wave chapters dive into the science behind how the waves form, what remains unknown, and their future as the climate crisis continues. Scientists believed rogue waves violated the laws of physics and dismissed them until surprisingly recently. The many mariners throughout history who’d been mocked for their accounts of rogues weren’t vindicated until 1995. Thanks to simulations, scientists have since learned how rogue waves come to be. Predicting them, however, remains elusive. It seems that unpredictability is in the very essence of a rogue wave—they’re rogues but also rebels. By contrast, those other giants, tsunamis, follow rules.

Learning to predict rogue waves has a serious pay-off—every year wild seas that feature rogue waves smash numerous ships. Loss of life is high, and huge amounts of cargo spill into the ocean. The consequences of this lost cargo can be disastrous. Obviously, if the cargo is seafood, the harm to the environment is small, but rogue waves don’t distinguish, and plenty of lost cargo is hazardous.

At most, prediction right now involves watching meteorological maps to avoid ocean in the eye of a storm, and noting the temperament of certain areas in general. Some parts are always rough because of their submarine geography (huge mountain ranges, trenches, reefs), and how that geography is situated. The Cortes Bank, one hundred miles offshore from San Diego, is an example:

Emerging from the depths, [the underwater mountains that form the bank act] as one long trip wire for swells that have stampeded down from Alaska, focusing wave energy onto the bank like a giant magnifying glass. This refraction is so dramatic that when a swell hits Cortes under the right conditions, it can jack up to quadruple its size (meaning that a twenty-foot swell can churn out eighty-foot waves). The bank’s unique location, surrounded by abyssal waters and with nothing to buffer it from the full force of the open Pacific, made it a top candidate to produce not only a clean one-hundred-foot wave, but according to [wave-prediction expert Sean] Collins, “definitely a very good, rideable 150-footer.”

Casey turned similar intense attention to the people who race toward, not away from, the Cortes Bank and areas like it: Laird Hamilton and his posse of extreme surfers. As expected, these surfers are capable and confident, laser-focused on their interest, which for them goes beyond a hobby to a way of life. They religiously follow weather reports and hop on planes immediately to catch waves moving up a coast. Sleep deprivation is par for the course. Hamilton and other seasoned extreme surfers aren’t arrogant, though. Despite his effortlessness on the waves, Hamilton knows that in a match between him and a giant wave, the wave always has the upper-hand. He’s experienced too many broken bones, concussions, and close calls (as have his friends) to think otherwise. He’s so aware of the ocean’s precariousness and power that he’s almost superstitious, refusing to make a prediction about how the next day’s waves will treat him. However, that reverence doesn’t soften the impression that extreme surfers are a foolhardy breed. Casey’s final portrait is of people addicted to the high they get when their brains are flooded with endorphins and oxytocin—natural opiates and biological relatives to heroin and morphine. Hamilton is obsessed, and he and his friends feel an insatiable urge to risk their lives regularly for no other reason than the thrill.

Like the giant waves it worships, Casey’s book can be overwhelming. The details are fascinating but too numerous to remember upon a first reading. That’s particularly true for the sections on Hamilton and his friends. From them Casey collected so many close-call and unbelievable stories that they blend rather than stand out. She could have trimmed her content here. The most memorable is memorable only because it’s outlandish: In a race against the clock to save a bleeding man in aggressive surf, a stark-naked Hamilton swims yards to a Jet Ski he then hotwires using earbuds.

The scientific parts, with more distinguishing, straightforward information, are easier to absorb. Lots of historical accounts about downed ships and ravaged land add texture and enliven the science. Casey talked a lot about these waves as they concern injury and destruction. It can be hard to comprehend the destruction of water, maybe because the average person is used to seeing it flow tamely out of faucets, in creeks, along gutters. But of course that gentle flowing will change if conditions change:

The force of waves is hard to overstate. An eighteen-inch wave can topple a wall built to withstand 125-mile-per-hour winds, for instance, and coastal advisories are issued for even five-foot-tall surf, which regularly kills people caught in the wrong places. The number of people who have witnessed a hundred-foot wave at close range and made it back home to describe the experience is a very small one.

Casey says this on page eight, priming readers to feel full appreciation for the many surfing and historical anecdotes that follow. Told with especially good suspense is the part about the 1,740-foot tsunami that rose up out of Alaska’s Lituya Bay in July 1958 following an avalanche.

The Wave is an ideal union of author and topic. Casey successfully shaped countless facts into a story, taking readers on an adventure with Hamilton, but also using history and wave science to add dimension to that adventure. She wrote description with artistry, choosing wording that’s pretty and somehow always original. Just when it seems she’d reached peak artistry, she outdid herself a few pages later. It’s needed writing for something as visually spectacular as walls of water:

I heard it before I saw it, the exploding curtain of glass that hammered onto the reef, the lip of a thirty-foot barrel hitting the earth like a liquid apocalypse. From a visual standpoint, Teahupoo was a looker. Rich lapis, deep emerald, pale aquamarine—its waters were the color of jewels, and its heavy white crest glittered in the sun. But even though the wave was gorgeous, it had the personality of a buzz saw.

Her descriptions are the next best thing to actually seeing these waves; nevertheless, the book’s eight pages of dramatic photos are a necessary addition. Although she asks readers to process a lot of information, Casey wrote clearly and had an obvious main idea: The ocean is powerful and capricious. Much remains a mystery. It doesn’t seem to like rules, and both playing in it and studying it require respect and humility.

[Frederick Bingham · Rating 3 out of 5]

What a lost opportunity.

It's hard to complain when a book is published that describes some of the science behind waves. Being somewhat of a specialist in this area (a physical oceanographer), it is great to see my field popularized in this way. Unfortunately the author chose to present the science behind waves in a very shallow way. Instead she chose to spend the book talking about a group of big-wave surfers. There are guys with egos as large as the waves they surf, and lots of money too. How they get the funds to jet off to Tahiti or South Africa at the drop of a hat is not explained. I suppose they get enough from sponsorships to do this - they must get a *lot* as they do a lot of traveling. One of the main guys, Laird Hamilton, said he has jet skis tucked away in Tahiti in case he needs them. Who can afford to have spare jet skis on hand in Tahiti?

The science of ocean waves is so interesting. The author could have discussed the difference between shallow water and deep water waves, or what refraction is and how it works (she mentions the term but does not explain it), or some discussion of *why* the wave field is forecast to become more energetic as the Earth warms or how the propagation of tsunamis is so different from regular waves.

One wonders if this lack of depth is a result of the author's limited understanding of it herself, or an attempt to draw readers into the world of big-wave surfers, or a need to dumb the science down for a general audience. Some dumbing down is always necessary of course in a popular book. This one just seemed dumbed down way too much.

Nevertheless, looked at as entertainment, the book was pretty good. She is a good writer and knows how to tell a compelling story. I just wish she had used that talent more wisely.

[Lisa Vegan · Rating 4 out of 5]

When I moved this book from my to-read shelf to my currently reading shelf I noticed that I have several other books about huge waves on my to read list and I’m not sure I chose the best one to read. One of them is The Power of the Sea: Tsunamis, Storm Surges, Rogue Waves, and Our Quest to Predict Disasters by Bruce Parker and is probably the one I should have read. I still might but maybe I shouldn’t read any of these. For decades I had a recurring nightmare about tsunamis that started when I was 14 and I still occasionally have those dreams. I didn’t have any tsunami dreams when I was reading this book so that is good and has me more willing to read more books about the subject.

I was most interested in middle of the ocean rogue waves and in tsunamis but this book is heavy on the big wave extreme toe surfers. Those parts were also interesting. I would have liked those parts even more if there had been more exploration about why these people do what they do. The surface psychology of it was addressed but it didn’t go deep. I noticed that on at least one occasion the author felt hesitant to ask a personal question of a traumatized surfer. She reluctantly asked but did not presssure him to delve deeply. She became good friends with these surfers and their families and sometimes that sometimes did make the book better but sometimes I think it accounts for her neglecting to go deeply into their psychology, motivations, etc. There was nothing profound about that in this account. I’m fascinated about why these people take the risks that they take. I get the “high” that they get but I wanted to know more and hoped that the book would help me understand them better.

There are wonderful, useful multiple maps and photos. I enjoyed the quotes that start each chapter.

I thought I’d like this more than I did, be more interested in the extreme surfing. I loved the 1966 movie The Endless Summer which looks G rated tame and sedate compared to this sort of surfing. I saw that movie with my father in a theater when I was about 12. The difference between those surfers and these surfers is immense. It’s a completely different sport. If I can find the movie I might watch it again. While reading this book and after I’d finished I’ve watched several short videos of these big wave surfers.

Mavericks is local so I am familiar with it. The competition there always makes my local news. I really enjoyed that chapter.

The Lituya Bay chapter was my favorite as it described waves over 1700 feet which is difficult to imagine. I was also captivated by the Cortes Bank chapter. It’s in my state and I’d never heard of it.

I appreciated how climate change was addressed even though it wasn’t the main focus of the book.

I was impressed with how the author got right in there. She did not do her research just from afar. She was a good person to write this book. She is a surfer. It’s an incredibly well researched book. She spent five years writing it and it shows. I might read her other book. It’s about great white sharks and the locale is just of the coast of San Francisco, where I live, so it’s of particular interest to me.

In the Bibliography there are lists of Books; Scientific Publications, Periodicals, and Newspapers; and Websites.

Contents:

Introduction
The Grand Empress
Broken Skulls
Schrodinger’s Wave
Karma, Tiger Sharks, and the Golden Carrot
Wave Good-bye
Mavericks
I Never Saw Anything Like It
Killers
Egypt
Out, Way Out, on the Cortes Bank
The Wild Coast
At the Edge of the Horizon
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Selected Bibliography

This is an enthralling and absorbing book and I’m glad that I read it. I think that “The Power of the Sea…” book might interest me even more than this one and I might read it at some point.

[Will Byrnes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Size matters to Toronto-born Susan Casey, wave size that is. She is interested in the big kahunas of wave-dom, rogues, freaks, giants or monsters that rise a hundred feet or more above the surrounding water. Think The Perfect Storm. Then think bigger.

Scientists once dismissed the notion of waves that big, but science has started to turn what were believed to be tall tales into accepted truth. In 1933 a serene officer on the USS Ramapo measured one such rogue at 112 feet! Even the enormous (see, I didn’t say titanic) cargo carriers of today are no match for such fury. Current models of oceanic wave generation have not been up to the task of predicting when and where these big guys might emerge. Given how much material is transported across the ocean there is considerable interest in improving our wave prediction capabilities. Add to that the impact of global warming, which is expected to increase the volatility of the seas, and the need to understand the mechanics of the briny deep becomes critical.

Casey alternates between looking at the science and history of waves and the surfer royalty who travel the world in search of the biggest, scariest monster waves to ride. She talks with the people who know huge waves best, in both scientific and surfing communities.

It must have been really tough for Casey to hang out with all those gorgeous, energetic, fit, scantily clothed men, but she made that sacrifice and offers a close up view of the high-end surfer culture. In particular she focuses on Laird Hamilton, the Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods and Babe Ruth of the sport, trailing after him and his cohorts as they seek out that perfect ride, succeeding, failing, wiping out and telling tales of how they got all those nifty scars. Of course, one might wonder how an outsider, even one with a publishing resume like Casey’s, which includes The Devil’s Teeth, a best seller about great white sharks, could gain such intimate access to the surfers’ world. Cash helps. Hamilton was paid to ease Casey’s way into this [primarily] boys’ club. So while Hamilton no doubt deserves all the accolades that come his way for his professional achievements, one must always wonder what might have been left out. [see http://www.quillandquire.com/blog/ind...] Nevertheless, Casey joins Hamilton and many other top names in surfing as they drop in at the major surf meccas of Hawaii, surf in Tahiti, California and Mexico and even catch some monster waves a hundred miles out at sea. Going rogue for real. It makes for gripping reading.

The scientific chapters are less personal but more informative. Casey relates some chilling history of tsunamis, both the regular and mega varieties, including one puppy that topped out at 1,740 feet in Lituya Bay in Alaska in 1958. The results on the ground were impressive. That two people in a boat survived this may be more impressive. She visits Lloyds of London to find out just how big an issue losses at or because of the sea might be. She hears from crew members about a voyage on the oceanic research ship Discovery, an outing that included getting battered by multiple hundred-footers coming at the ship from many directions, and she reports on a conference where the biggest brains in the wave business gather to discuss their work. There is surprising information here on how some waves act more like light than matter. And there is a nifty bit of info on just how Britain came to be an island.

Casey offers a less than lovely look at the future through the eyes of Bill McGuire, a world expert on global geophysical events, or as he likes to call them, “Gee-Gees.” He has acquired nicknames like Disasterman and the Prophet of Doom. In the disaster movie of your choice, McGuire is the guy who would be dragged away from his child’s graduation to advise the president, or the PM, as this Englishman works in London.

By offering such different perspectives, Casey has succeeded in teaching us a lot about an important subject while at the same time providing an exciting, entertaining read.

Dude, this is one wave you really want to catch.

[Maria V. Snyder · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow! I loved this in-depth look at giant waves! Not only does the author explore the science behind the phenomenon of rogue waves but she also included the surfers who dare to ride them! It’s an older title, published in 2010, so I’ll be googling what has happened to many of the surfers and looking for more books about waves. I might be researching for a future book. Natural phenomenons like giant waves and big storms fascinate me. Not a surprise considering I have a meteorology degree and use to dream about chasing tornadoes. 😁

[Eric_W · Rating 4 out of 5]

edited 3/12/11 to add references and some links

We are surrounded by waves: electromagnetic, light, radio, and water. They can be helpful providing power, light and communication; but they can also carry unimaginable force.

The science of waves and surf forecasting is relatively new. It began in earnest during WW II when scientists realized that successful amphibious landings required some ability to forecast surf sizes on the beaches. It didn’t hurt that there was oodles of money available and scientists, no different than anyone else, like nothing better than to specialize in something that has practical applications for war.

Reports of huge, 100-foot waves have traditionally been dismissed as typical seafaring exaggeration. Shackleton reported having his ship tossed about by the largest wave he had ever seen and one that towered over his ship. Large, seemingly unsinkable ships have disappeared without a trace. One ship that did, the Munchen, left a lifeboat that had been torn from its davits and which normally was suspended 65 feet off the deck. And yet, the physics of waves didn’t predict the possibility of such waves except in extraordinarily rare circumstances, so rare, as to be literally incredible.

Technically a “rogue wave inn oceanography, is more precicely defined as waves whose height is more than twice the significant wave height (SWH), which is itself defined as the mean of the largest third of waves in a wave record.”

A scientific discovery ship aptly named the Discovery was tossed around like match wood in a storm on the way to Iceland. Fortunately the captain was able to save the 200 foot vessel which was layered with scientific instruments which recorded periodic waves of 100 feet among normal sets measuring 45 feet.

Jan 1, 1995 something happened that made scientists reconsider. On a platform in the North Sea. Seas were high, running around 38 feet as measured by instruments on the platforms underside until an 85 foot wave hit the rig at 45 mph coming out of nowhere. The first confirmed measurement of a freak wave, more than twice the size of its neighbors. The engineers who designed the rig had built it for the one-in-10,000 year 64 foot wave. 85 foot waves were not part of the equation. The emphasis soon shifted from whether these waves existed to how and why they occurred. An oil rig, the Ocean Ranger, went down off Newfoundland that had been designed to withstand 110 foot seas. There were no survivors. (Things were a little more complicated than just the wave according to this entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_Ra...) Casey’s version is sensationalized and you have to take some of her descriptions with a dose of salt.

Interesting facts: two large ships sink every week, but the causes are usually just attributed to bad weather. Unlike when an aircraft goes down, rarely is there an investigation that’s more than cursory.

Casey alternates between science and the more prosaic, like surfing. (Her adulation for Laird Hamilton carries a sexual tension that should have had Laird’s wife, herself a striking former beach-volleyball pro, (http://gabriellereece619.typepad.com/...) more than a little concerned. Their swim out to “Jaws” and back and then getting hosed off bordered on prurient.) Some of her similes border on the silly, likening a personal characteristic to being “as wide as interstate 10,” whatever the hell than means. We follow Laird around the world seeking the ever more thrilling ride, as Laird laments the ever-larger crowds, crutches like Surfline that forecasts huge swells with precision, and sponsors and contests. (It should be noted that Hamilton gets lots of endorsements so he can afford to be dismissive of those seeking greater glory.) There’s also little examination of the effect and controversy of tow-in surfing, really the only way to get to the right spot for gigantic waves. Hamilton’s long-time tow-in partner Derrick Doerner even though, as I understand it, he was a champion paddle-in surfer (true surfing??) many years before his connection to Hamilton. Perhaps he was less Adonis-like than Hamilton.

The answer to the formation of these freak/rogue waves was found in quantum physics and Schrödinger’s equation (for you math types: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schr%C3%...) which describes deep water waves (they have found some waves 600 feet high rumbling around below the surface) and surface waves that become unstable and a central wave will “rob energy from its neighbors” making the troughs on each side of the enormous wave very deep. (The BBC series cited below has some spectacular graphs showing this.) What makes these waves especially dangerous for ships is that they aren’t the typical waves with sloping sides that ships are designed to handle. Rather, these have very steep sides and deep toughs on either side. The captain of the Queen Mary who saw one of these said it reminded him of the cliffs of Dover, straight up. And they break, which means you have millions of tons of water dropping on you, about 100 tons per sq. meter as opposed to a 12 meter wave that’s about 6 tons per sq. meter. (That would make a great Disney ride although it would be guaranteed to bring on massive puking.)

For the truly paranoid or apocalypticly oriented types, I recommend reading the section on the side of the mountain in the Canary Islands that's due to collapse into the ocean generating a 100 foot wave along the east coast of the United States; or, Latuya Bay in Alaska that generated a 1,000 (yes, that's one thousand) foot high wave following an earthquake in 1958. I mean, really. (The USC Tsunami Research Group found evidence the wave may actually have been 1,720 feet high. - http://www.usc.edu/dept/tsunamis/alas... - I thought Casey was exaggerating so I had to look it up. The wave snapped trees that were six-feet thick.)

Perhaps my favorite part of the book was the section on salvage tugs and their crews. Those who have read other reviews of mine will understand the attraction I have for these stories. Farley Mowat wrote a wonderful novel about ocean-going salvage tugs: The Grey Seas Under: The Perilous Rescue Mission of a N.A. Salvage Tug. One of the hazards Mowat doesn’t even mention was dealing with dangerous cargo. The worst is undeclared pesticides or herbicides. The regulations in carrying such cargo are so onerous –and properly so– that the incentive to carry them illegally is huge. When a ferry, the Princess of the Stars – capsized off the Philippines the salvage experts discovered an extremely hazardous pesticide, Endosulfin, that would have caused devastation on a nearby Sibuyon Island, environmentally pristine sanctuary. Other hazardous cargo such as phenyl, a common ingredient in plastic causes paralysis when its fumes are inhaled. In one case cyanide powder had been labeled as flour.

These intrepid souls head out in the absolute worst weather to rescue ships in distress (For a great video of one such French ocean-going tug see: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w8K2B1.... (I get seasick just watching this video, notice the wave breaking on the bridge.) For a high seas rescue check out the video of the Flandre’s sister ship, the Bourbon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5Na8E....

For a very unusual salvage story see In Peril: A Daring Decision, a Captain's Resolve, and the Salvage that Made History

I would have preferred a little more science (the title is misleading, it’s really more hagiography of Laird Hamilton) and a little less surfing (I'm exaggerating a little, perhaps I'm just jealous.) She’s a good writer although I should point out one never says 25 knots per hour; 25 miles per hour or 25 knots. John McPhee, Casey is not. Nevertheless, it’s a fascinating read.

Confirmed from space: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/na...

The BBC has a nifty series of videos with some great footage at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Htq57D...


Popular Mechanics article Dec 1972 “Little Boats that Go Out to Save Big Ones”: http://books.google.com/books?id=69QD...

[Susan · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was so good at explaining complex science in accessible terms, and overall it was very interesting. Basically, Casey hypothesizes that global warming has produced enormous, rogue waves much more frequently than has ever been thought. One such documented wave in the 1950's in Alaska measured a staggering, atypical 1,740 feet. The implications of this, especially if you own real estate on a coastline, are sobering. However, in her examination of the surfers who risk their lives to ride these 60-100 footers, the adulation she showers on Laird Hamilton, her main subject, proved a fatal flaw for this reader. It's clear that Casey's heart was all in with the sexy surfers and their unique, laid-back-but-testosterone-driven culture at the expense of her forays into scientific inquiry. This was a serious pity, since she is a very, very good science writer who blends the art of writing with the objectivity of science gracefully and well.

The jacket copy misleads readers to suggest that the book examines science and surfing with an equal eye. I liked the content of this book better than a 3, but I found the pervasive Laird-worship just a bit cringeworthy at times. To my thinking, the true and unsung heros are, in fact, the scientists who devote much of their lives to studying this alarming, increasingly important phenomenon for relatively little pay and less glamour. They certainly don't bag Red Bull and Monster sponsorships, nor do they get a yearly Oscar ceremony. I like Beautiful People (these would be the Surfers) and admire their exploits, don't get me wrong, but the two diverse cultures made for a queasy and uneven blend. Call me a geek. I won't argue.

[K.J. Charles]

A book about really big waves, focusing partly on the science and scientists, somewhat on shipping, and an awful lot on surfers. Unfortunately, I didn't share the author's admiration/fascination for surfers, so I ended up skimming considerably. The parts about salvage and marine catastrophes were really interesting, and the history: I had no idea Lisbon was flattened by a tsunami in the 18th century.

[Allen Roberts · Rating 5 out of 5]

From the book:

”The wave was breathtaking. As it rose, its face opened up to the cliffs and its lip curled over a full-bellied barrel. Except for luminous glints of turquoise at its peak, the wave was sapphire, gin clear, and flecked with white. If heaven were a color, it would be tinted like this. You could fall into this water and happily never come out and you could see it forever and never get tired of looking. Jaws did not permit its spectators to daydream about being somewhere else, to feel bored or irritated or jaded. Watching it was an instant antidote to petty problems. There could be no confusion about who called the shots out here, at this gorgeous, haunted, heavy, lush, primordial place, with all its unnameable blues and its ability to nourish you and kill you at the same time. There was unspeakable power at Jaws, but it was the beauty that got me.” pp. 359-360.

This book is about waves—more specifically huge, gargantuan, deadly ocean waves, those who have survived them at sea, those who risk their lives to save others from them, and those who risk their lives to ride them for the joy and challenge of it. The book also touches on those who study them scientifically, and the befuddling complexity of trying to understand them. (Spoiler: It ain’t exactly easy). Another big takeaway is that due to planetary climate change, storms are getting more intense, and the big waves are getting even bigger, which is bad news for both coastal communities and travel on the ocean.

The book is written in a journalistic series of vignettes, rather like a series of National Geographic pieces, albeit very good ones. Much of the focus is on big wave surfers, such as legendary badass Laird Hamilton, the king of big wave riders, and other surfing icons such as Dave Kalama, Brett Lickle, and Jeff Clark, among others. There are lots of great, hair-raising stories of surfing and ocean-going adventure.

I’ve got nothing but respect for big wave surfers, and also for all seafarers who brave dangerous waters. All in all, this is a well-written, highly enjoyable, interesting, and wild ride. Recommended. 5 stars.

[Josh · Rating 2 out of 5]

After reading the intro and getting scared to death about being on a boat caught in a massive storm, i was frighted and excited to learn more about the processes that go into forming these freak swells. I was intrigued by how ms casey would tie the surfing pursuit of big waves with the science behind how waves work together. In the end i felt that it was a failed attempt. She should have just written a biography on laird hamilton as that is largely what i felt the book was. the science and discussion was poorly explored or explained and at times downright misleading. as a physicist i could tell that she did not pick up on the subtly of what many the scientists she interviewed told her. further, her narrative almost implied that the surfers understood the processes that the scientists studied better. At the end, i respect big wave surfers as i know a few, but it is not what interests me in surfing, so if the book had been advertised as being about big wave surfers i would not have picked it up. I picked it up as what promised to be a pop science exploration of ocean processes. I got a lot of what i was not interested in and a little of what i wanted to read about but poorly done. I feel that as a non-scientist she did not know how or what to write about in the science of waves that would be interesting, but had a contract to write the book so filled in the story by hanging out with the strapped crew. will not read again and would not really recommend unless you want to learn about laird hamilton and his quest to surf massive ocean waves. end of the day not a pop science book.

[Becky · Rating 5 out of 5]

Despite being from Nebraska, I will be screaming about waves now for at least a month.

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

Okay, I want you to do something for me. Close your eyes.

Wait. No, that won't work. Open your eyes again.

Eyes open? Good. Now imagine you've closed your eyes, but don't actually close them because that will rather impair your ability to read this review.

So, you're imagining that your eyes are closed. Now imagine you're on a cruise ship. It's a lovely place - blue water, blue skies, the faint scent of salt in the air, the waves lapping up against the hull of the boat in a soothing rhythm. It's a perfect way to spend a vacation.

You get a daiquiri and lean on the railing, looking out towards the horizon. This is nice, you think. Just what I -

Wait. What is that?

You shield your eyes from the sun to get a better look and see what looks for all the world like a shadow on the horizon, stretching long and with flecks of light shimmering off its top. As it gets closer, it gets bigger, and you can feel the boat drop under your feet. The water gets higher and higher, and you know this can't possibly be happening because for the wave to be that high, it would have to be at least sixty or seventy feet. In thirty-five foot waters.

A shadow is cast over the boat as the wave crests above you, and the last thing you think before the top comes down, shattering the cruise ship like it was made of so much balsa wood, is, "I wonder what it would be like to surf that...."

It has often been said that we know more about the surface of the moon than we know about our own oceans. I have no idea who first said it, or in what form it was said, but reading this book drives home that it is absolutely correct. What's more, that ignorance may well kill us. The oceans are full of relentless mysteries and hypnotic beauty, but also terrors and dangers the likes of which we shorebound humans have trouble understanding. The sea has always been a dangerous place, really. We know that. What we don't know is what all of those dangers are.

Tales of giant waves have been around since antiquity, but until recently, people didn't really believe them. It defied everything that was known about the ocean - to say nothing of common sense - to have waves appear out of nowhere, rise to heights of up to a hundred feet or more, wreak havoc on oceangoing vessels, and then vanish. These were the tales of sailors, whom everyone knew could not be trusted to tell the truth about their journeys.

Perhaps that is why Casey chooses to open with a scene from a research vessel in the North Atlantic. The RRS Discovery was on a routine mission to gather data about the sea between the British Isles and Iceland when it found itself under attack by the ocean itself. The ship was hit over and over again by waves reaching up to sixty feet, then dropped down into the void between waves and lifted up again, over and over for five days. Things that weren't bolted down flew in mad directions all over the ship, and many things that were bolted down - like lifeboats - were ripped off their moorings. It was so terrifying that the scientists on board, after they had gotten home, wrote one of the very few research papers that included a note at the end thanking the captain for bringing them back alive. Only great skill and good luck saved that ship from oblivion in waters that seemed to have risen up for the sole purpose of destroying it.

No one - no weather forecaster or meteorologist, oceanographer or climatologist - no one thought that waves of that size could exist under those conditions. And yet there they were, and the Discovery's instruments captured it all.

Scientists who study the oceans are just beginning to understand how waves work on the ocean, but the almost infinite number of variables that contribute to making waves is so overwhelming that it's hard to conclusively predict where and when these rogue waves will appear. Other people who work with the sea - salvage operators, ship captains, insurers - know that this kind of thing is possible, and that the sea carries risks with it that no other form of transportation faces. Every year, dozens of ships are lost, and with them go many lives and countless dollars worth of merchandise. Some of these losses come from human error, but others come because the ocean is an inherently dangerous place for us to be. It is vital for our safety and our economy that we know how the ocean works, but we are nowhere near being able to do that.

What's worse, the onset of climate change could make current models obsolete as the seas become higher, rougher, and more unpredictable. We are racing against the clock - and losing.

But for all the scientists who are trying to map the behavior of waves, there is a community of people who seek them out. People who know the waves intimately, even if they can't write an equation to tell you what it is they know, exactly. These people are the surfers, and if there was ever a group of people more attached and attuned to the sea, they'd have to be mermen.

Casey spends a lot of time with surfer Laird Hamilton. I wanted to say "the famous Laird Hamilton," but I didn't know the man existed until I read this book, which makes him one of those people who is very famous, but only to the kind of people who would find him famous. Now that I know more about him and his community, though, I can certainly understand why he has the prestige that he does. Among big-wave surfers, he is a legend. And that takes some doing.

To ride a regular wave, you see, you get out there with your board, get behind the point where the waves start to break, and paddle to catch up. With the big waves, though, they're moving much too fast for a paddler to get into position, so the big-wave riders have someone on a jet ski to pull them along. Once in position, the jet ski goes down the back of the wave while the surfer heads down the front where, hopefully, he won't be killed. If he falls off, his partner has to come in, find him, and get them both out before the next giant wave - and where there's one wave there are always more - comes in to crush them both. Regular surfing has its share of dangers, but the perils of big-wave surfing are orders of magnitude worse.

There is a whole community of surfers looking to ride these great waves. They travel across the world on the mere possibility of great surfing, heading to places with names like Jaws, Mavericks, or Egypt, all in the hope of catching the biggest waves. Injuries are common, and sometimes terrible. Death is always an option. But they come anyway, just for that moment of zenlike awareness of the Eternal Now that you can only truly achieve when you're riding down the face of a wave and trying not to die.

I don't like the ocean, myself. I find it too big, too impersonal. It's a place that could swallow you whole and leave no trace you were ever there. It's a place that cares nothing for us puny humans and will, on a whim, try to destroy us. I certainly appreciate the ocean and what it does for us, and it's nice to look at. But I certainly don't trust it, and this book really didn't help in that regard. From tales of ships crushed by rogue waves south of Africa to waves so large and so powerful they could strip the bark off the trees they uprooted, it was a testament to the fact that the moment we underestimate the ocean is the moment it kills us.

What's more, with climate change being what it is, our problems with the ocean are going to turn into new and different ones. The models we have now - good though they are - are incomplete, and the changes that are coming in the future will keep scientists on their toes for years to come. As Casey notes, wave science is a very young discipline, but it is one that needs attention if we're going to safeguard our coastal cities and global commerce.

This book is an exciting read about a topic you've probably never given much thought to. You fear for both the surfers and the scientists, and in the end realize just how much there is about the ocean that we still don't know. I don't know about you, but it kind of freaks me out....

--------------------------------------------------------------
"If you can look at one of these waves and you don't believe that there's something greater than we are, then you've got some serious analyzing to do and you should go sit under a tree for a very long time."
- Laird Hamilton
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[Deb (Readerbuzz) Nance · Rating 4 out of 5]

"A wave might seem to be a simple thing, but in fact it's the most complicated form in nature. Scientists even find it difficult to agree on a basic, all-around definition of what a wave is. Many, but not all, waves move a disturbance through a medium. That disturbance is usually, but not always, energy. A wave can store that energy or dissipate it. Paradoxically, it's both an object and a motion....In order to exist, wave require a disturbing force and a restoring force."

I knew nothing about waves before I read this book-for-book-club book; honestly, I don't think I wanted to know anything about waves.

Well, that's what I thought. Wrong.

Susan Casey is one of those amazing nonfiction writers that can take on a subject that might make you roll your eyes in boredom and explain it in ways that not only are easily understood but are also captivating.

"When you're actually on a giant wave...the experience is like a collage of sensory impressions. There may be a flash of white spray, a sudden jolt, a feeling of energy surging beneath your feet, the suspension of time so that ten seconds stretch like taffy across a violent blue universe. Inside the barrel, a place that surfers regard with reverence, light and water and motion add up to something transcendent. It's an exquisite suspension of all things mundane, in which nothing matters but living in that particular instant. Some people spend thirty years meditating to capture this feeling. Other ingest psychedelic drugs. For big-wave surfers, a brief ride on a mountain of water does the trick."

Casey explores the world of big-wave surfers, as well as taking on stories of some of the most huge waves known to man. It is absolutely mesmerizing.

[Susan (aka Just My Op) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Don't take this book as your leisure reading on that next cruise or you will be constantly watching the horizon, wondering if that next freak wave is on its way.

My reason for reading this book, subtitled In Pursuit of the Rogues, Freaks, and Giants of the Ocean, is that I wanted to learn more about huge waves, tsunamis, and ocean behavior. I was not so much interested in the surfers or their stories. However, not far into the book, that changed.

The author talks with scientists studying the phenomenon and hangs out with the surfers who tackle these big waves. Despite the recent improvements in monitoring and measuring, the science still has a long way to go and the ocean is still wildly unpredictable. While the scientific information is interesting and enlightening, I really enjoyed getting a bit into the minds of the big-wave surfers who attempt challenges most of us would never even dream of trying. Some have paid with their lives. Many are part of a close knit pseudo-family, enduring the squabbles all families have but watching out for one another, often at the risk of their own lives.

“If I scare myself once every day, I am a better person,” he had said, “It helps to have that little jolt of perspective that life's fragile.”

(This quote is from an advance bound galley, so may have changed in the published edition.)

The number of huge ships, especially the low-riding tankers, that just disappear without a trace and with little if any media coverage is amazing. Often these ships are registered to countries with loose maritime standards and crewed by under-trained third world natives.

The book also contains information on maritime insurance, climate change, marine salvage companies, lots of people and organizations involved with the vagaries of oceanic behavior.

I do wish the author had explained a few more of the surfing terms for the uninitiated, like I am. That is my only quibble with the book, and it is a minor one. All in all, the book is a fascinating read.

I was given a copy of the bound galley by the publisher through Goodreads.com, for which I am very grateful.

[Irene · Rating 3 out of 5]

In this book, journalist Susan Casey investigates the world of extreme surfing, those who travel the globe, spend a fortune and risk their lives to ride ever larger, more dangerous, more powerful waves. She invites the reader to spend time with a band of surfers, to listen to what drives them. Between the chapters with these men, she interviews physicists studying waves, salvage crews rescuing ships broken by waves, shares archived accounts of people who lived through extraordinary waves and hears the concerns of insurers and others whose economic success can be destroyed by freak waves. I read this because it fulfilled a challenge, but I also hoped to understand men who would risk everything, who are willing to endure horrendous injuries and watch their colleagues die, just for a thrill. That did not happen. I admire firefighters, police officers, social workers serving in dangerous neighborhoods and others who risk their lives for little gain just to help others, to make the world a bit better for someone else. But, I still can’t comprehend nor condone engaging in such dangerous behavior for bragging rights or an adrenalin high.

[Saleh MoonWalker · Rating 4 out of 5]

Onvan : The Wave: In Pursuit of the Rogues, Freaks, and Giants of the Ocean - Nevisande : Susan Casey - ISBN : 767928849 - ISBN13 : 9780767928847 - Dar 326 Safhe - Saal e Chap : 2010

[Trish · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Wave is an outrageously good read, alternately thrilling and terrifying us in turns. How many ways can a wave be described? As many ways as there are waves, though one suspects the Hawaiians had more words for the qualities of water than we do. While surfing plays the loudest chords in this book, one of the most resonant notes played was a description of Lituya Bay in Alaska, where epic waves scour the coastline. I went back and forth with the narrative to examine the included photographs again and again. Pictures help, but Casey’s descriptions are harrowing.

Reading (or writing!) about surfing could be a difficult endeavor. After all, unless one is on the wave, it is difficult to get a feel for its power. Even watching from shore doesn’t give one any real feel for what is going on in the water. Casey brings us up close and personal, partly through her access to the men who ride in wild conditions, and partly through her use of language and imagery to describe different conditions: “Among big-wave connoisseurs, Ghost Tree wasn’t especially beloved. It didn’t break that often, and when it did it lunged open in a maniac sneer, spitting foam and tangled rafts of kelp.” For me, I have an indelible picture of this vicious water, as in this different, but equally effective description of Mavericks: “The Aleutian swells thunder three thousand miles across the North Pacific, barging past the continental shelf until their progress is rudely halted by a thick rock ledge that juts offshore about a mile from Pillar Point, near Half Moon Bay’s harbor. When it hits this shallower depth, the wave energy rears up, shrieking and screaming, forming the clawed hand that is Mavericks.”

As I read, I was reminded of Yvon Chouinard's autobiography Let My People Go Surfing because while the visionary businessman and adventurer lamented climate change and the disappearance of glaciers, he prepared for it by developing a bigger line of surfing products. If there is going to be more water everywhere, Chouinard suggests, that's where the business opportunities are for the outdoorsman. But even now we see that the biggest waves are becoming too much for the surfboards now made. Laird Hamilton, surfer extraordinaire, is trying new hydrofoil boards to take on the larger, more destructive waves being generated in oceans whose currents and temperatures are changing.

This book is the equal of Born To Run, the word-of-mouth bestseller among athletes and couch potatoes alike. One doesn’t have to do more than act like a sponge to enjoy this extraordinary book.

[Der-shing · Rating 2 out of 5]

Waste of time. Rogue waves... just the visual alone of a liquid mountain rushing, unstoppable, across the open ocean, is enough to make the imagination race. What causes them? What specific weather phenomena, geology, geography, climate, etc? What type of physics lies behind these mass movements? What are the effect of waves on humans and the world? There are so many questions! I enjoy watching footage of waves and reading anecdotes of people who have encountered them, so this book seemed like an interesting doorway into that world. What I got instead was a love-letter to competitive sport surfers, a distressing lack of information about the basic science and mechanism of waves, and a lot of useless, pointless information.

If this book has been framed as a book about big-wave surfing, I could have given it a higher score (if I had bothered to read it, which I wouldn't have). The book is, however, centered around giant and unpredictable waves. She decides to approach the subject emotionally instead of having any sort of deeper interest in the waves themselves, or doing basic research on physics beforehand. She attends a scientific conference in which she shows up late, is clearly more entranced by the surfing going on outside, and where she doesn't understand any of the science until it is anthropomorphized (the then tries to ascribe morality to waves). She also spends such a huge amount of time telling me how much body hair certain people have, or how much their eyes glitter, or what famous personality they look like. It seems disrespectful to the scientists who work hard to understand the world, and insulting to the reader who picked up this book to get a bridge between a layperson understanding and a highly technical explanation. She does, however, talk about how tall everyone is, and what expressions they make when they are thinking, especially if it is Laird and he is doing something attractive.

I was terrifically disappointed. It felt like I was following a giggling fan into the locker rooms and then forced to watch her sit down every so often for classes, mechanically questioning everyone unanswerable questions about climate change to make her sound topical and engaged. And then suggest that scientists are less able to understand these waves because they sit at computers with their glasses on instead of rippling their attractive bodies over 40 lb boards. Very offputting.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is too predictable to say that Susan Casey wrote a great piece of non-fiction. As the author of countless articles in mainstream periodicals like Outside, National Geographic and Men's health, to being the current editor of O Magazine, to writing the gripping and meticulously researched "The Devil's Teeth", you come to her second book expecting excellence and she does not disappoint. Casey follows two groups of individuals in parallel- big wave scientists/ researchers, and big wave surfers. Coming from the premise that most people see big waves as something to be avoided, she attempts to understand people who consciously devote their lives to them, intellectually (through the researchers) and physically (through the surfers). Subsequently the book is a great read, breaking up the occasional tedium of academia with the adventure of big wave chasing.
The only downside to this book is that Casey attempts to argue that global warming is creating seas that will be more unpredictable and serve up larger waves. While she always asks her scientists about this possibility, the argument seems tacked on at the end of the chapter, eclipsed by the larger-than-life characters that pepper the book. While she may be accurate in this conjecture, it seems as if she hoped it would be the moral that wrapped up the book whereas it ended up being a sidenote.
In short, The Wave was another engrossing read by Susan Casey, and I look forward to seeing what topic she adeptly tackles next.

[Wendy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought this book was going to be about ships. While a few chapters are devoted to maritime accidents and research, most of the book is devoted to surfing. To my surprise, I still liked it despite having zero interest in surfing, probably because focusing on surfing allowed positive stories instead of all negative disasters. I also learned a bit, such as that ships are lost weekly, that freak waves are far more common than believed, and that surfers now use jet skis to take them out beyond the big waves. I'm not a fan of tow surfing or jock worship, but I enjoyed watching many videos on youtube of the waves described in the book. 'The Wave' is a good book and Susan Casey is a good writer.

[Rick Spilman · Rating 2 out of 5]

Sea monsters exist. They break ships in half and pull them below the waves. Sometimes they swallow them whole. Most who encounter them never return to tell the tale and those few who do, until very recently, were rarely believed.

I am referring to rogue waves, which until only the last decade or so, have been dismissed as myths, merely sailor’s tall tales. Only in roughly the last ten or fifteen years has the existence of rogue waves been fully documented and accepted by oceanographers. Scientists are only beginning to gain some understanding of how and where the waves rise up from the oceans to crush the unfortunate and the unlucky.
I am intrigued, fascinated and a bit frightened by rogue waves, so when I saw Susan Casey’s new book, “The Wave: In Pursuit of the Rogues, Freaks and Giants of the Ocean” I was excited. I want to learn more a about rogue waves and this book looked like it could tell me what I wanted to know. Sadly, was I wrong. Very wrong.

Casey’s book is a hyper-kinetic jumble which primarily focussed on surfing. Yes, surfing. And not just any surfing but specifically an extreme form of surfing involving jet skis called “tow surfing.” What does this have to do with rouge waves? As far as I can tell, absolutely nothing.

We should first define out terms. From Wikipedia, not Ms. Casey’s book, the following definition: “rouge waves (also known as freak waves, monster waves, killer waves, extreme waves, and abnormal waves) are relatively large and spontaneous ocean surface waves that occur far out in sea, and are a threat even to large ships and ocean liners. In oceanography, they are more precisely defined as waves whose height is more than twice the significant wave height (SWH), which is itself defined as the mean of the largest third of waves in a wave record. Therefore rogue waves are not necessarily the biggest waves found at sea; they are, rather, surprisingly large waves for a given sea state. Rogue waves are not tsunamis, which are set in motion by earthquakes [and] travel at high speed, building up as they approach the shore. Rogue waves seem to occur in deep water or where a number of physical factors such as strong winds and fast currents converge.“
Ms. Casey spends most of her book following around a band of extreme surfers who travel the world looking for those places where ocean swells collide with reefs and generate huge breaking waves. This is all well and good except that breaking waves and crazy surfers have nothing to do with rogue waves. She also spends considerable time on tsunamis, often shifting directly from a discussion of rouge waves to tsunamis, unaware or unconcerned that the two have relatively little to do with one another.
It only gets worse when she starts discussing ships. She seems to know that there are ships called bulk carriers, that they sink frequently and that having hatch covers ripped off in heavy weather is a bad thing. Beyond that things get really fuzzy. She does mention he sinking of the LASH ship MS München, but she calls it a container ship, rather than a barge carrier with a load cargo of steel products stored in her 83 lighters. In this case, the details do matter. It appears highly likely that the München was struck by a rogue wave. What is known of her sinking is a fascinating if horrifying tale, which Ms. Casey chooses not to tell.

She goes on at greater length regarding the sinking of the MV Derbyshire, which may or may not have been sunk by a rogue wave. A study performed in 2000 suggests the Derbyshire sank due to progressive flooding in a typhoon. An excellent animation of how the ship is believed to have sunk can be found here for anyone who may be interested.
Ms. Casey also seems to have a touch of xenophobia regarding the ship’s crews. Her repeated references to “third wold crews” do not appear complimentary. In discussing the Derbyshire she notes, “unlike other lost ships, this one wasn’t flying a Liberian flag and manned by Laotian sailors.” Elsewhere she comments on the global crew shortage: “This lack of expertise was especially troubling given the next-generation ships, floating colossi with complex computer navigation systems to master, not always a snap when the manual’s written in German and you speak only Tagalog.” Obviously crew training is important but it is hard to tell if she is making that point or simply insulting Philippine mariners. And like so much else in the book, it has very little to do with rouge or freak waves.

Ms. Casey is the editor of Oprah Winfrey’s magazine “O” and the Wave reflects a certain style of personality driven journalism. Often the book feels like a series of profiles of the surfer dudes who surf huge waves and the scientists who study the huge waves. After several chapters of following the surfers doing insane things on massive breakers, Ms. Casey finally goes to a conference on waves where we meet the scientists, learn that the math they use is really complicated and very little else. She never does the hard work of finding someone to translate the scientific jargon and mathematics into language understandable to the layman. Mostly she appears bored, preferring to be back out with the surfers. “The presentations continued in a blur of wave theory while outside the real waves grew. Surfers streaked past, filling the windows.”

We do get nice little portraits of each scientist and surfer. At the conference we come to know more what the scientists look like and wore more than what they are working on.

Just two examples of many:
Peter Janssen was up next, and he unfolded his tall, wiry frame from his chair and strode to the podium. He had wild gray hair, a peppery beard, and a strict, professorial appearance that seemed intimidating until you noticed the sparkle in his eyes.

It was impossible not to like Cavaleri, a whip-smart man in a no-nonsense plaid shirt, his sleeves rolled up, his caterpillar eyebrows jumping around on his face, his hands swimming through the air.
And so on and so on.

In the end “The Wave: In Pursuit of the Rogues, Freaks and Giants of the Ocean” comes off as primarily a travelog of a journalist hanging with lots of surfer dudes and a few scientists. If you want to learn about the people who do crazy things on surf boards on huge waves, then this is the book for you. If you want to learn anything about rogue or freak waves, you are better off just doing a Google search.

[David Rubenstein · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is quite a fun book to read. Most of the book is about a crazy sport called "tow surfing". Surfers are towed by jet skis, and are positioned on monster waves that are coming in to shore. Thirty, forty-foot waves are easy. The big ones are sixty, seventy feet or even more! It seems like total chaos. Often there are a few helicopters flying overhead, that double as photography platforms and rescue vehicles. Jet skis are criss-crossing each other, and sometimes tow-ropes get intertwined. A clump of ruined jet skis litter the beach. If a surfer falls from his board, he may be underwater for up to a minute, while additional giant waves pummel him.

Some of the chapters are about the science of forecasting giant waves, and a few chapters are about the danger that freak waves pose to ships, large and small. Good ship captains know that in a big storm, they should steer into the swell and make slow headway, in a "hove-to" position. However, commercial ship captains are under heavy pressure to get their cargoes to port, and fast. So, if they cave in to this pressure, or if their obsolete ships lose hatches due to waves crashing down, they can be caught by a freak wave and sink.

There is strong evidence that freak waves are not rare occurrences. Storm-driven freak waves are occurring more frequently, as are tsunamis. Their frequency is increasing, largely due to global climate change. In the case of tsunamis, the increase is due to earthquakes associated with the rising sea level.

The book does seem to be a bit schizophrenic--one chapter about surfing, the next about ship disasters, then one about wave research, followed by another and another about surfing. You can get dizzy!

[Les Gehman · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Wave by Susan Casey is an excellent chronicle of the people who chase big waves, and the people who try to understand and predict them. About half of the book follows Laird Hamilton as he chases the biggest waves in the world to surf, while the other half documents the scientists who strive to understand what causes rogue waves and how to build ships and platforms to withstand them.

Laird Hamilton and his fellow tow surfers are insane. They risk their lives to ride ever larger waves. Casey does a great job of capturing the surfers intensity and the risks they face. I would have liked to read more about the scientists and their work in predicting waves and also more detail about the destructive power of the waves. However, all in all, this is a wonderful book and well worth reading.

[Matt · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book dedicates about 3/4 of its pages to the surfers that ride giant waves, and about 1/4 to the science behind them. All in all, very cool, and not being a surfer myself, I found myself enjoying those parts more than expected. As famed critic Joshua Brustein points out, the hero worship can get to be a bit much (especially with Laird... geez Susan, he can't be that cool), but it doesn't take too much away from the content.

I would have enjoyed a little more time dedicated to the science, especially the relation between climate change's effect on giant waves and what it means for specific places. Still, well done. The only element I thought was largely missing was the viewpoint of the surfer's family, especially given how dangerous the whole business of riding 100 ft waves can be.

The first quote I think summarizes Susan Casey's writing style, and the second is her attempt to summarize our relationship, even kinship, with waves.

"... a true waterman could swim for hours in the most treacherous conditions, save people's lives at will, paddle for a hundred miles if necessary, and commune with all ocean creatures, including large sharks. He understood his environment. He could sense the wind's subtlest shifts and know how that would affect the water. He could navigate by the stars. Not only could he ride the waves, he knew how the waves worked. Most important, a waterman always demonstrated the proper respect for his element. He recognized that the ocean operated on a scale that made even the greatest human initiative seem puny."

"Like the sea, we are always in motion. The waves loom in our dreams and in our nightmares through all of time, their rhythms pulsing through us. They move across a faint horizon, the rush of love and the surge of grief, the respite of peace and then fear again, the heart that beats and then lies still, the rise and fall and rise and fall of all of it, the incoming and the outgoing, the infinite procession of life. And the ocean wraps the earth, a reminder. The mysteries come forward in waves."

[Baq · Rating 2 out of 5]

TL;DR: This book should have been called "My Obsession with Laird Hamilton and Some Other Stuff about Big Waves".

To understand how I feel about this book, just filter the reviews by 2 stars. I agree with a bunch of those reviewers, whose views can be summarized as:
* though the synopsis does mention big wave surfing, the book also sells itself as a scientific exploration of rogue waves, and so caveat to the reader who's looking for a good pop treatment of the science of large waves.
* the scientific exploration in this book comes up very, very short. Rogue waves are a real phenomenon with lots of cool science going on to research them (how does the ocean produce these giant waves for which we have no solid predictive models for?), but this book pays lip service to that research.
* the book is jumbled: talks about tsunamis and rogue waves and big wave surfers and none of them really have anything to do with each other except that they all involve the ocean and superficially, waves.
* too much attention is paid to how awesome Laird Hamilton and his crew are, how ripped they are, their conversations and lingo and what drives them.
* it was awkward how much easier she found it to describe how scientists looked and what they wore rather than come up with a coherent, lay explanation of the research they were doing.
Of the books I've read about the all consuming power of the ocean, I'd recommend The Perfect Storm: A True Story of Men Against the Sea or Isaac's Storm: A Man, a Time, and the Deadliest Hurricane in History. These are narrative non-fictions by some great authors that actually do delve into the science of waves (and storms).

[Audrey Approved · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've officially finished all of Susan Casey's books! She's become one of my go-to nonfiction authors for her focus on all things oceans, the readability or her writing, and her interweaving of personal and investigative storytelling. My ranking of her books is:
1) The Devil's Teeth: A True Story of Obsession and Survival Among America's Great White Sharks (altho if I didn't live in San Francisco and see the Farallons frequently I might not rate it so high)
2) The Underworld: Journeys to the Depths of the Ocean
3) This book
4) Voices in the Ocean: A Journey into the Wild and Haunting World of Dolphins

I'd call The Wave 70% big wave surfing (we're talking >50 feet here) and the remaining 30% a combination of wave history, shipping/shipping insurance, and a little sprinkle of science. I would have preferred more of that last bucket, but the one thing I did take away from the scientific content is that we basically understand nothing about waves. But overall this is an easy and entertaining read if you have any interest in the subject!

[Uyennie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't know who's more bad azz in this book...Laird Hamilton and his gang of Watermen or the scientists who also brave scary risks in the pursuit of knowledge. I also found the section on the marine salvagers really fascinating.

Although some of the science section is a bit arcane for the average reader, I think most semi-intelligent people will get the main gist of the concepts.

The stats on how many ships go missing is astounding. As Casey points out, if even a small plane went down, we'd hear about it in the news. Yet, ships apparently routinely go missing and the world is ignorant about it. The history of Lloyd's of London is also fascinating. I have more respect for them now knowing their maritime origins instead of just knowing they insure crazy celebrity body parts. It takes a pretty skilled author to make an insurance company sound interesting.

The only reason this didn't rank a perfect 5 star is the number of surf stories. While they were definitely harrowing and exhilerating and Casey does a good job of taking the reader there, after so many, they started to blend together - big scary waves that can do major damage to a downed surfer.

Other than that complaint, the glimpse into the surfing culture, and the scientific knowledge from the book was fascinating.

[Anthony · Rating 2 out of 5]

It was ok. 3/4 of the book is a surfer lovefest. Maybe a Laird Hamilton crush. Don't get me wrong, I am a huge fan of Laird and all the big wave surfers. I enjoy surfing (not anywhere near their level). It is just that having watched the dvds Riding Giants and Step Into the Liquid I could have written 3/4 of this book. Ok, I will be fair 1/2 the book. I enjoyed rehashing what was already covered in the movies. I liked the maritime disasters. I wish she put more research into her book. More story telling in the maritime. I just saw a 48 hours mystery type documentary on the Oceanus. She glossed over this and said the Captain and crew left first and that was about it. Too bad she didn't take the time to research this tragedy. She could have really brought up a fascinating and gut wrenching story. The bay in Alaska was fascinating. I thought the book would be equal parts surf, maritime, tsunami, science. Of course, not surprisingly, the science she uses is suspect. She is part of the "Global Warming" cult. It was disappointing because it is titled Wave. I thought it would be more about the wave.

[Robynn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm fascinated with surfing and big waves. My family is from Maui and I regularly check out Hookipa when I visit. One of my bucket list items was to catch Jaws in action but my family visits have mostly been in the summer. Luckily, one Thanksgiving visit, it hit. Locals and visitors alike gathered on the cliff to check out the big wave riders.

This book helped me understand more about the science of waves, surf culture, and Maui's north shore. Although the book takes the reader all around the world including NorCal's Mavericks, Mexico, South Africa, and Tahiti, I'm taking The Wave back to Maui because it's really anchored by people who live there.