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Riptide
WELCOME TO SURFSIDE… IT’S A GREAT PLACE TO DIE!
Surfside—an up-and-coming coastal paradise where the sun is shining, the water is warm, and the women are beautiful.
For former St. Louis Detective Michael Stark, it’s a fresh start—an escape from the notoriety and scandal of the life he left behind. But when a rogue tiger shark begins to terrorize this coastal community, Stark and his partner, Liza Sallings, are tasked with stopping the bloodshed.
Meanwhile, just offshore, another danger is gathering: a hurricane unlike any the Gulf Coast has ever faced…
Note: this work is presented as it was originally created and may contain outdated and offensive cultural depictions.
Surfside—an up-and-coming coastal paradise where the sun is shining, the water is warm, and the women are beautiful.
For former St. Louis Detective Michael Stark, it’s a fresh start—an escape from the notoriety and scandal of the life he left behind. But when a rogue tiger shark begins to terrorize this coastal community, Stark and his partner, Liza Sallings, are tasked with stopping the bloodshed.
Meanwhile, just offshore, another danger is gathering: a hurricane unlike any the Gulf Coast has ever faced…
Note: this work is presented as it was originally created and may contain outdated and offensive cultural depictions.
308 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published September 1, 1984
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
May 27, 2026
The best B-book ever written. (Recently republished by Fathom Press)
Our hero in Riptide, and I use that term in the loosest possible sense, has a backstory that sounds like it would have been an action-packed crime thriller best seller. Michael Stark was a St Louis cop who took on a sniper serial killer in a long and drawn-out manhunt. The killer was someone from his past who was now massacring innocent people in St. Louis for a wrong he believes Stark did to him. The sniper’s body count is hilarious and gives you a little taste into what is to come; pregnant women, children Etc. Stark has a downtown shootout with him near a floating McDonald's on the river. St Louis people…did you really have a floating McDonald’s in the early 80s?? Tons of innocent bystanders get killed. It reminds me of the movie Demolition Man. The case and publicity ruin his life, so he leaves his family and moves to Florida to take this easy job as a detective in the small beachfront town of Surfside.
So basically, Riptide is the after-story of the tough as nails cop who went one-man-army against a psycho killer who is now taking it sleazy in big titty bikini land, sort of battling a giant tiger shark and surviving a devastating hurricane.
A huge part of what makes Riptide so fun is you never where it’s going. There are so many avenues this goes down that will make you literally say, “wait, what?” out loud.
The basic set up is- ex St Louis-super cop gets new position in beach town, meets a plethora of smoking hot to trot ladies that he must navigate through, he has to catch a rapist on the nude beach, and there is a giant tiger shark eating people but in the end it doesn’t matter because a catastrophic hurricane is about to kill ninety thousand people. And we’re there for all of it. Crime, horror, sleaze and disaster novel all rolled into one.
Right away we get our first shark kill. A man sitting on the edge of a dock, completely out of the water is attacked when a rushing explosion of sharp-teeth shark-mouth chomps down on his leg and drags him in; a gurgling scream reaches no one’s ears from under the surface of the water.
Our hero Stark shows up at his new Surfside precinct. Yes, our hero’s name is one letter off from the word shark in a book about a killer shark. Stark is taken aback that not only is his superior Liza Sallings a woman, but she is also incredibly hot. You are probably wondering about her bra size. Well don’t worry because Cheatham lets us know it’s a 36D. These first two chapters are the perfect introduction to this book. Here is what’s on the menu, insane shark attacks and porn stars playing the roles of professional career women and neither ever lets up.
Let’s take a quick look at a small sampling of the insanity:
A shark chomping off a person’s head
A bus full of the elderly drowned
Hurricane winds blowing people’s skin right off their bodies
A guy riding a shark
A hurricane orgy with a death count
Undercover at the nude beach
Shark-Stark staring contest
Fires, floods, tan lines, no tan lines, hammerheads, hangovers, legs, pubes, killer pebbles, orgies, guns, tiger sharks, Jaws references, snakes, boobs, police work, bikinis, mothers and children eaten by sharks, incest twins eaten by sharks, cheating wives eaten by sharks, tourists eaten by sharks who are then immediately eaten by a bigger shark, and surprisingly lots of factual information on the ocean, sharks and hurricanes.
Our hero in Riptide, and I use that term in the loosest possible sense, has a backstory that sounds like it would have been an action-packed crime thriller best seller. Michael Stark was a St Louis cop who took on a sniper serial killer in a long and drawn-out manhunt. The killer was someone from his past who was now massacring innocent people in St. Louis for a wrong he believes Stark did to him. The sniper’s body count is hilarious and gives you a little taste into what is to come; pregnant women, children Etc. Stark has a downtown shootout with him near a floating McDonald's on the river. St Louis people…did you really have a floating McDonald’s in the early 80s?? Tons of innocent bystanders get killed. It reminds me of the movie Demolition Man. The case and publicity ruin his life, so he leaves his family and moves to Florida to take this easy job as a detective in the small beachfront town of Surfside.
So basically, Riptide is the after-story of the tough as nails cop who went one-man-army against a psycho killer who is now taking it sleazy in big titty bikini land, sort of battling a giant tiger shark and surviving a devastating hurricane.
A huge part of what makes Riptide so fun is you never where it’s going. There are so many avenues this goes down that will make you literally say, “wait, what?” out loud.
The basic set up is- ex St Louis-super cop gets new position in beach town, meets a plethora of smoking hot to trot ladies that he must navigate through, he has to catch a rapist on the nude beach, and there is a giant tiger shark eating people but in the end it doesn’t matter because a catastrophic hurricane is about to kill ninety thousand people. And we’re there for all of it. Crime, horror, sleaze and disaster novel all rolled into one.
Right away we get our first shark kill. A man sitting on the edge of a dock, completely out of the water is attacked when a rushing explosion of sharp-teeth shark-mouth chomps down on his leg and drags him in; a gurgling scream reaches no one’s ears from under the surface of the water.
Our hero Stark shows up at his new Surfside precinct. Yes, our hero’s name is one letter off from the word shark in a book about a killer shark. Stark is taken aback that not only is his superior Liza Sallings a woman, but she is also incredibly hot. You are probably wondering about her bra size. Well don’t worry because Cheatham lets us know it’s a 36D. These first two chapters are the perfect introduction to this book. Here is what’s on the menu, insane shark attacks and porn stars playing the roles of professional career women and neither ever lets up.
Let’s take a quick look at a small sampling of the insanity:
A shark chomping off a person’s head
A bus full of the elderly drowned
Hurricane winds blowing people’s skin right off their bodies
A guy riding a shark
A hurricane orgy with a death count
Undercover at the nude beach
Shark-Stark staring contest
Fires, floods, tan lines, no tan lines, hammerheads, hangovers, legs, pubes, killer pebbles, orgies, guns, tiger sharks, Jaws references, snakes, boobs, police work, bikinis, mothers and children eaten by sharks, incest twins eaten by sharks, cheating wives eaten by sharks, tourists eaten by sharks who are then immediately eaten by a bigger shark, and surprisingly lots of factual information on the ocean, sharks and hurricanes.
July 5, 2026
A giant shark, a horny cop and a hurricane walk into a coastal town in Florida...
This is basically a Jaws ripoff and has plenty of violent and lurid shark attack descriptions, which I thought were the best parts of the book. Prepare for plenty of eye-rolling when it comes to the main character's sexism and the story does get bogged down at times with the focus on some not so interesting characters but overall this was ridiculous, fun and entertaining. Perfect for summer reading!
Thank you to Fathom Press for sending me a copy of the book.
This is basically a Jaws ripoff and has plenty of violent and lurid shark attack descriptions, which I thought were the best parts of the book. Prepare for plenty of eye-rolling when it comes to the main character's sexism and the story does get bogged down at times with the focus on some not so interesting characters but overall this was ridiculous, fun and entertaining. Perfect for summer reading!
Thank you to Fathom Press for sending me a copy of the book.
July 28, 2026
3.5 I suppose
This is the kind of vintage paperback novel that is hard to arbitrarily assign a ranking to. On one level, it's a poorly written book, with shallow characters with no arcs, poorly put together story structure, and doesn't even pay off all of it's minor set ups, and that's putting aside of course it's extremely dated views, which frankly, one should put aside when reading something like this. On the other hand, it's pretty damned entertaining, trashy, dumb, and at times brutal in it's dispatching of human characters. There are several laugh out loud moments of absurdity strewn throughout the book, and some silly spiciness as well, though perhaps the most unbelievable moment in the whole novel was when one character ordered a piece of banana cheese pie! WTF?!? In any case, the climax is suitably over the top and enormous in one sense, but disappointingly drops the ball in terms of what happens with our main characters during said climax. It's a weird one all around, but I certainly don't regret the brief amount of time I spent reading it.
This is the kind of vintage paperback novel that is hard to arbitrarily assign a ranking to. On one level, it's a poorly written book, with shallow characters with no arcs, poorly put together story structure, and doesn't even pay off all of it's minor set ups, and that's putting aside of course it's extremely dated views, which frankly, one should put aside when reading something like this. On the other hand, it's pretty damned entertaining, trashy, dumb, and at times brutal in it's dispatching of human characters. There are several laugh out loud moments of absurdity strewn throughout the book, and some silly spiciness as well, though perhaps the most unbelievable moment in the whole novel was when one character ordered a piece of banana cheese pie! WTF?!? In any case, the climax is suitably over the top and enormous in one sense, but disappointingly drops the ball in terms of what happens with our main characters during said climax. It's a weird one all around, but I certainly don't regret the brief amount of time I spent reading it.
April 18, 2014
Mind you, I read this as a teenager, but I loved it.
August 21, 2016
A deliciously terrible Jaws knockoff. I read it for a book report in 6th grade.
April 20, 2023
This book came from a parallel universe where Tommy Wiseau would have directed Jaws.
July 19, 2026
Ummm.... sure yeah I guess you could call this a shark book? There was a big shark, and it ate people sometimes!!
There's a bunch of random shit that leads nowhere. Like Liza and Michael constantly being sus of Jim, but that ended up being NOTHING. Michael falling head over heels for Carolyn and then immediately banging the hot young Ollie the second she's back in town. Michael's big shot detective backstory was so lame and just an excuse to make him a rich bachelor. Literally 80% of the town's population being obliterated in the hurricane, but that's okay because they're gonna make it even better than before!!! What the ffffuck was the point?
Michael lusting over every woman he fucking meets was annoying as fuck. The only remotely enjoyable characters were the women (Juanita, Liza, and Carolyn did a lot of heavy lifting). And man, even Liza had her obnoxious moments. Author tried too hard to make her a "cool girl".
Annoying ass book ended up being about a hurricane more than a shark.
There's a bunch of random shit that leads nowhere. Like Liza and Michael constantly being sus of Jim, but that ended up being NOTHING. Michael falling head over heels for Carolyn and then immediately banging the hot young Ollie the second she's back in town. Michael's big shot detective backstory was so lame and just an excuse to make him a rich bachelor. Literally 80% of the town's population being obliterated in the hurricane, but that's okay because they're gonna make it even better than before!!! What the ffffuck was the point?
Michael lusting over every woman he fucking meets was annoying as fuck. The only remotely enjoyable characters were the women (Juanita, Liza, and Carolyn did a lot of heavy lifting). And man, even Liza had her obnoxious moments. Author tried too hard to make her a "cool girl".
Annoying ass book ended up being about a hurricane more than a shark.
August 2, 2022
A giant tiger shark is ravaging the the town of Surfside. There is blood in the water, lots and lots of blood and body parts because this shark has an insatiable appetite.
For a shark book, I loved it, the attacks were chomping good … I wish the author would have maintained his focus on that instead of going off on a tangent at the end forgetting about poor Mr. Sharkie.
Keep in mind, this book was written in the 80’s so you are going to have a little mysogeny in there along with some horny people. Good grief. Everyone had sex on the brain and the main character wanted to bang any and all of the women he came across.
But, all that aside, if you love sharks, read this book and ignore all the other stuff.
For a shark book, I loved it, the attacks were chomping good … I wish the author would have maintained his focus on that instead of going off on a tangent at the end forgetting about poor Mr. Sharkie.
Keep in mind, this book was written in the 80’s so you are going to have a little mysogeny in there along with some horny people. Good grief. Everyone had sex on the brain and the main character wanted to bang any and all of the women he came across.
But, all that aside, if you love sharks, read this book and ignore all the other stuff.
March 22, 2024
Ho hum. That pretty much defines this book. In broad strokes: the first two-thirds are a standard shark story, nothing overwhelming or underwhelming. The characters are shallow and may be defined by a single characteristic, like the man-whore or the wanna-be tough female cop. You don't really care about any of them. The last third of this book becomes a disaster story. A vicious hurricane hits the island and the island survives, lots of folks die - a disaster. After the disaster? The last paragraph of the book is that same shark from the first two-thirds of the book. So, what was the point? Don't even bother ending it? Like I said... Ho hum.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 29, 2026
This was a bad book that I enjoyed at a five star level - the literary equivalent of a pulp Top Gun movie. We've got Michael Stark, he's a cop starting fresh on a Florida tourist island, we've got a 20+ foot tiger shark killing everything it can find, a once in a lifetime hurricane, nude beaches, hot hookups, naked orgies, deaths, action - we've got it all here.
I bought this to take on vacation but once I started reading, I could not stop and it's fun to read books like that every once in a while. You can call them beach reads or airport reads, I just call them fun palette cleanser books. It is not Dickens but it never tries to be.
This book was a fun time.
I bought this to take on vacation but once I started reading, I could not stop and it's fun to read books like that every once in a while. You can call them beach reads or airport reads, I just call them fun palette cleanser books. It is not Dickens but it never tries to be.
This book was a fun time.
July 30, 2026
I read the new reprint by Fathom Press. The author died in 2012 , but he wrote this back in 1984.
This book had 2 separate catastrophes A killer tiger shark with the love of human flesh stalks the area. And to top things off a 200 mph hurricane is coming straight to their little island.
This book had 2 separate catastrophes A killer tiger shark with the love of human flesh stalks the area. And to top things off a 200 mph hurricane is coming straight to their little island.
June 9, 2026
if bruno mattei
wrote a book while chugging wine
it would be rip tide
wrote a book while chugging wine
it would be rip tide
August 6, 2026
This is such a fun read. It’s absolutely terrible; just pure 80’s sleazy B-grade horror. I loved it.
Read
June 19, 2026So unhinged and unintentionally hilarious, male fantasy that becomes a parody of itself when it just keeps escalating and escalating and then a shark leaps 50 ft in the air and eats it
There's a sequence in this where the chief of police makes his 3 detectives go undercover on a nude beach and is adamant that all three of them get completely naked and be horny and then a shark leaps 50 ft in the air
There's a sequence in this where the chief of police makes his 3 detectives go undercover on a nude beach and is adamant that all three of them get completely naked and be horny and then a shark leaps 50 ft in the air
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews