She Treads Softly: In Deep Water

Wednesday, May 27, 2026

In Deep Water

In Deep Water: A True Story of Sharks, Survival, and Courage Book Cover

In Deep Water by Michael J. Tougias
6/22/26: 304 pages
St. Martin's Press

In Deep Water: A True Story of Sharks, Survival, and Courage by Michael J. Tougias is a highly recommended true story of survival along with insight into the Coast Guard rescue operations.

On October, 8, 2022 three friends from New Orleans, Paul, Lu and Sonny, take Paul's new boat out on the Gulf of America to fish. They are looking mainly for for red snapper by oil rigs in the area. After successfully fishing for hours the men begin to head in when they notice the boat is taking on water and ended up sinking 15 miles from shore. The men manage to get life jackets on and find two coolers floating in the water they tie together to use as floats. Awaiting rescue, the men end up in the water for a brutal 28 hours, all while enduring jellyfish stings, other fish nibbling them, and sharks circling below.

Tougias presents an hour by hour account of their desperate and determined struggle for survival, while also following the Coast Guard’s all-out effort to find several missing men that day, before the three missing men were brought to their attention. This is truly a race against time and it is a miracle that the three survived for that long. Highlighting the actions of the Coast Guard's rescue operations that day, along with the crew of the Jayhawk helicopter who rescue them, only increases the tension while reading. Their survival and the rescue really is a race against time.

This is a well-written, factual account that would actually make a great real life survival movie. The harrowing ordeal the three men survived along with the Coast Guard rescue is a compelling story of survival. Thanks to St. Martin's Press for providing me with an advance reader's copy via NetGalley. My review is voluntary and expresses my honest opinion.

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John Updike's six rules for reviewing:

1. Try to understand what the author wished to do, and do not blame him for not achieving what he did not attempt.

2. Give him enough direct quotation--at least one extended passage--of the book's prose so the review's reader can form his own impression, can get his own taste.

3. Confirm your description of the book with quotation from the book, if only phrase-long, rather than proceeding by fuzzy precis.

4. Go easy on plot summary, and do not give away the ending.

5. If the book is judged deficient, cite a successful example along the same lines, from the author's oeuvre or elsewhere. Try to understand the failure. Sure it's his and not yours?

To these concrete five might be added a vaguer sixth, having to do with maintaining a chemical purity in the reaction between product and appraiser.....Review the book, not the reputation.... Better to praise and share than blame and ban. The communion between reviewer and his public is based upon the presumption of certain possible joys in reading, and all our discriminations should curve toward that end.