Professor Jonas Taylor has spent the last 7 years trying to make sense of something terrifying he saw while on a secret scientific dive in to the Pacific ocean’s deepest canyon- the Marianas Trench. The dive goes horribly wrong and Jonas ends up being to sole survivor, with one hell of a story. He claims the sub was attacked by a prehistoric Megalodon. For years he is laughed at, but soon everyone will find out just how real the Meg is. Now something has brought her up from the depths. She is angry and is ready to turn the tides red.
Meg (Meg # 1) by Steve Alten. Published by Doubleday July 1997. My version is a Bantam paperback edition from June 1998. Originally read and reviewed in June 2016.
I’ll be honest. I LOVE sharks. I love the educational facts on sharks. Equally, I love good ol’ fashion B-movie shark fiction. Especially GIANT sharks! Helllllllloooooo megalodon!
Meg is one of the first megalodon books I ever read. It had me hooked pretty much right from the beginning. From start to finish, the book moves along at a pretty quick pace. There is plenty of shark carnage. This Meg is not shy. She likes to travel and tear shit up. Anything in her path gets demolished. Mr. Alten does not skimp out on the death and destruction. The whole plot is just straight up fun. Towards the end of the book, Jonas has a crazy showdown with the Meg! Absolutely bananas and epic as hell. I think anyone who likes a good B-movie creature feature / shark story would be right at home with this book.
I wasn’t overly fond of any of the (human) characters. They seemed to be the biggest draw back. Jonas seemed like he had the vibe of an 80 year old man yelling at kids to get off his lawn. The romance angle was ok, but a little predictable. I can always do without the romance part of books. I couldn’t stand some of the side characters. Yes, some of them you are supposed to hate, so that was all good and well… but some of them, I don’t think you were supposed to dislike them. But you know what? It didn’t matter if the characters were likeable or not because this is a story about a flipping Megalodon causing massive havoc in just about every ocean in the world. You don’t need people to like when you have giant sharks!!
Meg is a fast paced, giant shark action book. The characters are ok, while the megalodon clearly steals the show. This book sets out to entertain you, and it does a jawsome job of it. If you dig B-movie sea creature / shark fiction, OR you are looking for a great beach book, you should read Meg.
Creature From The Book Lagoon 
Reblogged this on Hobby Reads.
I read this back in the day and really enjoyed it. I still have my paperback copy from when it was released.