Shark Doc, Shark Lab takes the reader on a rare double journey. In part, it is the (authorized) unauthorized biography of Samuel Gruber (he insisted on ‘warts and all’): his intriguing upbringing replete with hints of what was to come, his eventual transformation from enfant terrible to a grand old man of marine biology. But it is the enthralling subject matter of his success—sharks—that gives this book its general appeal.