It's night time in New England.  The plaintive sound of a single harmonica drifts over the dunes of Amity Island.  A plume of fog steals around the corner of the wooden veranda of Minnie Eldridge's general store.  A lighthouse flashes its beam far out to sea.  And on a deserted part of the shore, the mangled parts of a swimmer's body lie among seaweed and flotsam.  Police Chief Martin Brodie investigates . . .

JAWS the novel was written by Peter Benchley and published in 1974.  The film, directed by Steven Spielberg, was made in Martha's Vineyard a year later.  Roy Schneider starred as Brody, Robert Shaw as shark fisherman Quint, and Richard Dreyfuss as oceanographer Matt Hooper.  Benchley played a cameo role in the film as a TV journalist.  Jaws was almost a disaster, partly because the mechanical sharks failed to function, but on release it became the most profitable film yet made until STAR WARS appeared in 1977.

Devised and painted by Darius Halpern Music by The Beach Boys