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Shadow Divers

The Bestselling World War II Classic - The True Story of Two Men Who Risked Everything to Solve A Historic Mystery
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Shadow Divers

By: Robert Kurson
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A true adventure in which two amateur scuba divers risk everything to solve a great historical mystery - and make history themselves

For John Chatterton and Richie Kohler, deep wreck diving was more than a sport. But in 1991, not even these courageous divers were prepared for what they found 230 feet below the surface, in the frigid waters of the Atlantic: a Second World War German U-boat, its ruined interior a macabre wasteland of twisted metal, tangled wires and human bones.

No identifying marks were visible. No historian, expert or government had a clue as to which U-boat the men had found, and the official records all agreed that there simply could not be a sunken U-boat and crew there.

Over the next six years, an elite team of divers embarked on a quest of increasingly perilous diving and painstaking archival research to solve the mystery. Some of them would not live to see its end. Chatterton and Kohler, at first bitter rivals, would be drawn into a friendship that deepened to an almost mystical sense of brotherhood with each other and with the drowned U-boat sailors – former enemies of their country.

Bestselling author Robert Kurson’s account of this quest is thrilling, vivid and emotionally complex. It’s a story of persistence, ingenuity and a shared obsession.

'This book is a work of art' RYAN HOLIDAY
'A pulse-quickening real-life thriller' New York Times
'A memorable story, beautifully told' The Times

© Robert Kurson 2026 (P) Penguin Audio 2026

 Adventurers, Explorers & Survival Engineering Maritime History & Piracy Military Water Sports World
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Critic reviews

The narrative is so well paced and constructed that it develops a hypnotic, almost suffocating tension … But it is far more than mere adventure; this is also a haunting, painful story of obsession and its attendant costs. For once, the comparisons with The Perfect Storm are not out of place; this is a memorable story, beautifully told. (Neil Hanson)
This book is a work of art. A diver (whose life principles we can all learn from) and a ship captain find the wreck of an unknown German U-Boat in 1991…on the coast of New Jersey. That’s a thing? Apparently. And they spend the next five years diving the wreck 230+ feet underwater until they identify it. This book is narrative nonfiction writing at its finest. Please read. (Ryan Holiday)
An engrossing saga of the suspenseful, intriguing, and dangerous underwater investigation of a Mystery U-boat. (Clive Cussler)
A gripping account of real-life adventurers and a real-life mystery. In addition to being compellingly readable on every page, the book offers a unique window on the deep, almost reckless nature of the human quest to know. (Scott Turow)
A tremendously suspenseful story of discovery that comes as close as any book could to providing the reader with approximate sensations of deep sea diving and of life on a submarine at war, and that leaves us with a hell of an impression of the grit, guts, and compassion of a U-boat crew and the two American divers who risked everything to solve the mystery of their last mission. (John McCain)
A winning tale exceedingly well told, Shadow Divers takes us on a dangerous and seemingly quixotic descent into the murk–and then, in a fog of nitrogen narcosis, brings us back to the surface with a richer, fuller fathoming of a history we only thought we knew. (Hampton Sides)
A pulse-quickening real-life thriller … written with great you-are-there intensity and dynamic verve.
Shadow Divers is not only a gripping adventure story, but a tale of dogged persistence and growing friendship. Mr. Kurson vividly captures the hazardous world of diving and the competition and camaraderie of the divers themselves.
An extraordinary, page-turning tale of undersea adventure, in which the relentless quest to explore and identify a sunken U-boat is not just about the technicalities of diving but about what drives us on and where the boundaries lie. (David Gibbins, author of A History of the World in Twelve Shipwrecks)
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