A seaworthy U-boat saga

The crazy, dangerous world of deep-sea shipwreck diving, and the discovery of a sunken German World War II sub off New Jersey, are woven into a tale of grit and friendship in the hot-selling summer read “Shadow Divers.”

Written by Esquire’s Robert Kurson, with the help of adventurers John Chatterton, the late Bill Nagle and Richie Kohler, the book is expected to rival “The Perfect Storm” and “Into Thin Air” in beach-chair popularity.

Kurson, who doesn’t even know how to swim, said he was drawn into the high-stakes world of deep wreck diving after a phone call from a friend.

The friend said that Nagle, a washed-up diver who ran a charter boat business, and Chatterton, who was working underwater construction for a living, had come across a sunken German submarine in 1991 off Brielle, N.J. No one, not even the Navy, had known or even suspected it was there, Kurson said.

With no knowledge of the dangerous and cliquey world of deep sea diving, a world inhabited by weekend warriors lurking in shadowy, lethal depths, Kurson was nevertheless intrigued.

“Would you believe that there are East Coast dive gangs with colors and stuff like that?” Kurson said. “That divers have tried to knife each other underwater over a teacup?”

Kurson, 41, pored over charts and history books, traveling to Germany and contacting the ex-wives and girlfriends of many of the team of 14 divers who investigated the wreck. “Most of these guys want to be the first to connect with a moment in time, to see a moment before anyone else,” said Kurson, who lives in Chicago. “That’s what motivates deep wreck divers.”

What they found in the Atlantic, at the perilous depth of 230 feet about 60 miles from Brielle, was the German sub U-869, long thought to have sunk off Gibraltar in 1945. Through Kurson’s research and the expedition’s discovery, the book reveals that instead the U-boat apparently was felled by its own backfired torpedo off New Jersey.

Kurson details the seeming desperation of the sub’s 56-member crew, reconstructing their stories through relics found in the wreck and interviews with their families in Germany. The sub had been ordered to New York but missed its rerouting instructions to Gibraltar and kept on going to New Jersey, the book says, but stops short of theorizing whether New York City or its neighbor state was a target.

Books about World War II and adventure tend to sell well, but “Shadow Divers” was bought mainly because of Kurson’s ability to tell a story, said Jonathan Karp, the editor at Random House who acquired it just 48 hours after receiving the book proposal. Kurson said he and the divers sold movie rights after a recent bidding war.

“We really thought it was going to be the next big thing,” Karp said. “I edited ‘Seabiscuit’ as well, and I’ve never seen a book take off like this.”

Kurson said he was drawn to the story because of its Regular Joes, men who want to grab a piece of history. “I don’t just want to inspire people to go deep wreck diving. I hope the book inspires people to push forward in their own passions.”