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

Susan Casey's writing style draws you into the book right away, and the subject she starts out with, a research vessel being pounded by epic waves in the North Atlantic, is well chosen.

Waves, giant waves, are the visible manifestation of the ocean's power and have awed people from time immemorial. She finds a good balance between giant waves as a threat but also fun for the daredevils of the surfing community, although even in describing the turquoise waters of a building wave, she always lets us palpably feel the undercurrent of danger. She also touches on issues of the effect of warming ocean waters on storm intensity and wave heights, the need for a re-evaluation of ship building designs, insurance issues and more. This is not a science book on waves or wave mechanics, of course, but a good romp through the world's ocean to encounter the "Big Ones" with useful background information.

Her overuse of metaphors, at least for me, is a bit tiresome at first, but that is a small aside in an otherwise very enjoyable book. Even a landlubber like me with an interest in ships but no concept of surfing got drawn into the excitement of that sport.

This book is awesome, I do not read much for pleasure and I could not put the book down. Well written and very exciting stuff.

I looked forward to reading this book, to learn something of the latest science of rogue waves. I learned Casey is an accomplished extreme sports writer and editor, but really isn't a science writer. Most of the book is on surfing of large windwaves in tropical areas, with acres of empty dialog and extreme admiration of (otherwise unemployed) professional extreme athletes (mostly) cheating death ("I stopped counting at 1000 stiches").

Balancing these rugged surfers are impotent scientists, having ignored sailors reports of extreme waves for decades as it didn't fit their scientific models. But Casey doesn't define any terms, explain the models, or even provide a coherent list of the physics of rogue waves. The book is loosely held together by the search whether climate change will make for bigger waves, but doesn't discuss climate change. She minces tsunamies due to tectonics, underwater landslides, unstable island slopes, with wind waves and internal waves. Swells are minced with offshore and onshore winds.

Piecing together over 300 pages of nicely written but meandering text, once can try to extract the leading theories of rogue waves -- swells and following currents, constructive interference of wind waves, new kinds of unknown waves, and something to do with quantum mechanics. Perhaps she touches on more. It's not clear she has talked to the right scientific experts, whom she paints as doddling, opportunistic, unwilling to learn each others mathematics, and unwilling to take to the sea. Her heros are the worldwise surfers who can read a weather chart.

On the positive side, there are some good maps at the front of the book, and the geography is interesting. Maybe if you are into extreme surfing, there are some interesting insights. The colour photos are nice, but mostly miss the point.

There is a rich history of science writing about physical aspects of our oceans that are more readable and more informative. For a book that is receiving high billing, it was a rather disappointing read. Casey did teach me the importance of having experience science writers write about serious science -- the book would be better to remove most of the more scientific chapters, and be retitled more along the lines of extreme surfing.