The great white gets all the press, but the shark most feared by people around the world is the bull shark, a fish of warm seas that even penetrates fresh water, swimming up rivers and into lakes. In Nicaragua, fishermen still pursue these unusual predators by dangerous, traditional means. Acclaimed travel writer Edward Marriott takes us into the brackish realm of the bull shark and the men who tackle it with their dugouts and handlines: The coastal and river people hunted the shark for its fins and for its oil, feared and revered it; every village had had family taken in its jaws. It was shark where shark should not be--in fresh water, on human territory. Along the way we learn about Nicaragua"s spicy cultural stew of indigenous Miskitos, Spanish conquerors, and Africans; about a country torn between Sandinistas and Contras; and about a creature that is quickly disappearing despite its fierce disposition. Readers with a scent for blood will not be disappointed--but the mythology of shark attacks on humans is perhaps even richer than the true-crime variety; indeed, Marriott infuses the country with a Marquez-like quality of magic that seems appropriate to a lake shark.