Within this publication, writer Melissa McCarthy traces lines of metaphor and meaning between sharks, death and surfers, exploring her subject through a range of historical contexts and perspectives. The publication is formatted to feel like a pocket guide or journal, of the sort that explorers might have taken on voyages around the world. We adapted a decorative italic typeface for titling throughout, with an exaggeratedly-slanted ‘A’ reminiscent of a shark’s fin, and the section titles are placed progressively lower on the page as the book progresses; sinking, so to speak. The cover features a blind debossing of an abstracted tidal wave, and the first section of the book is printed with woodcut illustrations of sharks, taken from a 16th century book by Guillaume Rondelet.
