Engaging and at times gripping, and filled with more than a little material not directly related to the subject three submarines. Reads more like a novel than a non-fiction narrative - Scott clearly takes a lot of liberties with the story...dialogue impossible to know (i.e. what a skipper said during the course of an event), but admittedly not impossible to reason out.

Scott includes lots of very specific details, demonstrating good research in to the post-war records. A good book, but not one I'd recommend to a submarine enthusiast. ( )

This is a gripping account of three submarines, their different commanders, and their attacks on Japanese ships. Its detailed descriptions of submarine strategy and the difficult decision-making involved in it are very interesting. The end of the story veers off into a lengthy account of Japanese internment camps, reminiscent of Unbroken. ( )

From the Charlotte Observer...
Focusing on three “boats” – Silversides, Drum and Tang – Charlotte native James Scott tells the story of the U.S. Pacific submarine fleet though accounts of men who lived for months at a time in a steel tube the length of a football field and less than 30 feet wide.
Among them, the three submarines sank a confirmed 62 Japanese freighters, tankers and transport ships. The Tang alone destroyed 24 enemy ships in nine months. The only other submarine with a higher tally took three years to sink 25 ships.
Scott, a former newspaper reporter, draws on copious sources, including interviews with surviving submariners and relatives, to recreate gripping scenarios. In one, he describes how the Tang’s storied commander, Capt. Dick O’Kane, watches in horror as a malfunctioning torpedo – the last in the sub’s arsenal before the crew heads home for a stateside leave – circles around and blows the boat apart. Kane and several crew members spent the remainder of the war in a prison camp notorious for its brutal guards.
Scott weaves the linear narratives of the three submarines over 51 patrols, spanning nearly four years, into a larger tapestry of underwater warfare. He describes how after the end of World War I, the U.S. Navy studied German U-boats to design faster, safer submarines and how America was blessed with strategic thinkers, including Rear Adm. Charles Lockwood Jr., who anticipated that a Pacific campaign would require submarines capable of traveling 12,000 miles and remaining at sea for up to three months.
Before then, Scott explains, submarines primarily were employed in coastal defense or in support of surface ships. Lockwood and Pacific fleet commander Adm. Chester Nimitz saw submarines as an offensive weapon. They knew that the Japanese empire, spread over an area twice the size of Europe, had to import many vital resources, including oil. Destruction of the enemy’s merchant fleet therefore became Task One for the U.S. submarine fleet.
U.S. subs sank more than 1,100 Japanese merchant ships and 200 warships, including a battleship, eight aircraft carriers and 11 cruisers. By war’s end, Japanese citizens were reduced to eating sawdust, and its navy was so short of fuel that remaining battleships and carriers had to be docked.
Two key factors in the “war below” were an intelligence coup and Japan’s failure to grasp how submarines would change the rules.
Early in 1943, U.S. cryptanalysts broke a sophisticated code Japan used in routing merchant ships. By intercepting transmissions in which ships signaled their position at set times each day, they were able to chart a ship’s course. That information was relayed to U.S. submarines, which lay in wait for targets that often were surprisingly defenseless, lacking either radar or depth charges.
By the time Japan adapted strategies and weapons to ward off submarines, Scott writes, the U.S. Navy had nearly quadrupled the Pacific submarine fleet, from 51 following the attack on Pearl Harbor to 182 at war’s end – not counting 52 boats that were lost. Furthermore, as the surface navy and ground forces pushed Japan’s defensive perimeter closer to the homeland, U.S. submarines spent much less time in transit and more time prowling enemy sea lanes.
Subs also proved their worth in less-heralded roles, from weather stations to rescuing downed American pilots. In one day, the Tang pulled 22 airmen from waters around Truk, in the Caroline Islands.
Scott doesn’t exaggerate when he says the impact of U.S submarines on the war far outweighed their numbers. Submariners comprised only 1.6 percent of Navy personnel, and only 16,000 ever saw action. Nevertheless, 3,500 – almost 1 in 5 – perished, the highest casualty rate of all U.S. military forces.
Their story is remarkable, and the author tells it remarkably well.
Terry Plumb is former editor of The Herald in Rock Hill.

I am glad that this book did not read like a commander's log book. Scott sews together many events to provide emotional glimpses into a submariner's life, both good and bad. The human element comes through in almost every chapter without bogging down the reader with technical details. These submarines were technically primitive and very uncomfortable but were effectively operated by men of unusual caliber. As a former submariner, I rank this as one of the best books of this genre.

There are so many books on WWII submarines of which I've read almost none it's hard to judge where this one stands. It is basically a retelling of many combat stories involving 3 of the top subs of the war, from the US perspective, with a few interludes to update on war happenings and sub-captain biographies. Some of the stories were pretty good, including the first appendectomy performed on a submarine (kitchen knives), the sinking of the Tang, the Japanese prison camps. It's definitely gung-ho USA as it racks up tonnage and ships destroyed counts, mostly a popular history. I'm not a huge fan of books that are broad and shallow, most stories never lasted more than a few pages, but I guess you can see patterns and gain experience that way. ( )