Jaws

Jaws by Peter Benchley

A Long Island resort town depends entirely on the summer tourist season for its livelihood. Early one summer, a woman goes missing after a late night swim. They discover parts of her body that were spit out by a shark. The local cop wants to close the beach, but the rest of the town does not for fear of negative impacts. Alas, this backfires as the shark goes to attack others. The book also takes us inside the "mind" of the shark as it seeks out others.

There are a few subplots in the movie regarding conflicts in the small town, marital infidelity and the mob. This mostly detracts from the primary interest of the shark. The shark is one powerful beast that is driven to attack animals that seem under stress. This results in the gruesome death of many people. The seems to be much smarter than the dumb fish that everyone things he is. The fisherman, the cop and and ocean scientist all go out to try to defeat the shark. Only one of them returns.