Episode · The Book Review · 2025-06-13
Books mentioned on 50 Years After ‘Jaws’ Terrified Filmgoers, a Reporter Looks Back
Gilbert Cruz discussed Jaws by Peter Benchley and The Jaws Log by Carl Gottlieb.
Books mentioned, in the order they came up
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Jaws
Jaws by Peter Benchley is a suspenseful thriller novel that follows a coastal community terrorized by a giant great white shark and the subsequent hunt to destroy it.
Discussed“So, for the 50th anniversary of Peter Benshley's novel last summer, you wrote just a wonderful piece for us here at the book review, looking back on that book and how it started this entire thing.”
Where to get it
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The Jaws Log
The Jaws Log by Carl Gottlieb is a famous behind-the-scenes account documenting the turbulent, highly detailed daily production history of filming the legendary movie Jaws.
Discussed“And then there's a very famous book that I know you have read, which is a book called The Jaws Log by Carl Gotautle, which I just read for the first time. Extremely entertaining. Carl got while working on Jaws apparently took the most detailed notes about every single day of production about writing. And it's probably one of the”
Where to get it
Other mentions in this episode (8) — ad reads, self-promotion and passing references, never counted
Plugged Best. Movie. Year. Ever.
“To help me celebrate the 50th anniversaries of both the book and the movie, I'm joined this week by Brian Rafterie, a longtime culture journalist and author of the book Best Movie Year Ever: How 1999 Blew Up the Big Screen.”
Passing The Day of the Jackal
“I mean, we're talking just after Frederick Forsight died and he wrote so many hit books, David Jackal and the Odessa file.”
Passing The Odessa file
“I mean, we're talking just after Frederick Forsight died and he wrote so many hit books, David Jackal and the Odessa file.”
Passing The Godfather
“and I do think again going to these 70s novels I think if you want to look at the godfather that's about 10 million things as well considering this is a book about a killer”
Passing 'Salem's Lot
“I do think it would make for a pretty great or interesting TV miniseries. No one should ever do that. I'm not recommending anyone ever do that because all people are going to do is think of Steven Spielberg's movie, but there's a lot of rich stuff there and it's one of those big sprawling books like Salem's Live or”
Passing Peyton Place
“I do think it would make for a pretty great or interesting TV miniseries. No one should ever do that. I'm not recommending anyone ever do that because all people are going to do is think of Steven Spielberg's movie, but there's a lot of rich stuff there and it's one of those big sprawling books like Salem's Live or”
Passing Red Dragon
“I love Manhunter, which like a man-made, which takes Red Dragon and gives it a new ending, which some people really don't like, but some people also absolutely know as the ending of Red Dragon.”
Passing Jaws
“Brian, thank you so much for coming on to talk about the 50th anniversary of Jaws by Peter Benshley, the 50th anniversary of Jaws, the alltime Steven Spielberg film.”