Hugo: How Two Boys Learned of Life from a Killer Shark

Hugo is the story of two boys, friends since early childhood, and their quest to catch a giant shark that swam the waters of coastal South Carolina during the summer of 1960. From the time they first sighted the behemoth they spent every day and many nights in the creeks, rivers and off the beaches of Beaufort County trying to catch a beast that dwarfed their leaky wooden skiff. It is a story of a simpler time. The boys’ boat had no depth meter and no compass. There were no cell phones, yet parents routinely allowed their children to vanish “down the river” for days on end to fish and explore and socialize, an easy parental willingness that ended when townspeople began being killed by a shark bigger than anyone had ever seen. It is a story of adventure, and of a summer that began in innocence, but ended in a tragedy that forced the boys toward manhood.