Men's Book Club discussion

The new Book of the Month will be Shadow Divers by Robert Kurson.

Feel free to post your thoughts on the book.

Awesome. I checked it out from the library yesterday. Really looking forward to reading it.

How far along is everyone?

I know that I'm quite a bit behind--I just started it.

I'm about 2/3 through it. I'm really enjoying it.

I'm on chapter 5.

I thought the first couple of chapters seemed to go a bit heavy on the dangers of diving and such, but once I hit chapter 3, I really started liking it.

I’ve never done any diving so a lot of information in this and in Pirate Hunters is brand new for me.

I'm way behind. Just started the book a few days ago, and on chapter 3. However, my impression after just a couple chapters is that this is a great choice for the men's book club. Informative, interesting, adventerous, etc.

I ended up finishing the book. Once I hit the halfway mark, I really didn't want to put it down.

Nice. I haven’t had much time to read the last couple days. I’ve got about 100 pages left. What did you think?

I thought the beginning was a bit repetitive, and there were a couple of places in the book where it seemed I was rereading what was already written, but overall, it was quite a read. The second half of the book just sucked me in. It's an amazing story.

I finished the book yesterday. I thought it was pretty great. I found some questions that maybe will spark some discussion. If you haven't finished the book, you may want to skip this. The questions do contain some spoilers.

1. Is there something you would risk everything - your family, sanity, and life - to discover?

2. Was it proper for Chatterton and Kohler to risk their lives, and the lives of others, by insisting that all divers allow the remains of the fallen U-boat sailors to remain undisturbed?

3. Chatterton and Kohler lost their marriages to their quest to identify the U-Who. Was it worth it?

4. Why weren't Chatterton and Kohler bothered more by the German sailors' mission - namely, to sink Allied ships and kill American sailors?

5. Do you think the U-Who's crewmen would have appreciated the efforts of Chatterton and Kohler to identify their submarine and explain their story?

6. The German government told Chatterton that all requests by scuba divers to explore sunken German war graves had been denied. Chatterton politely explained his intentions, then dove the wreck of the U-Who anyway. Was this morally acceptable?

7. Gisela Engelmann dearly loved her fiancé, U-869 torpedoman Franz Nedel, despite Nedel's fervent commitment to Hitler and Nazi ideals - and despite the fact that the Nazis had imprisoned both his father and Engelmann's father. Could you love someone whose political beliefs were abhorrent to you?

8. Despite claustrophobic conditions, many Germans preferred submarine service to army ground service, where they might find themselves dug into trenches and dodging enemy bullets. Which would you opt for?

9. Given the grave danger of Chatterton's final plan to dive the wreck of the U-Who, should Kohler have stuck to his first instinct and refused to accompany Chatterton?

10. Chatterton did not attend the funeral of his dear friend, Bill Nagle. He never completely explains the decision. Why do you think he didn't attend Nagle's funeral?

11. Divers continue to debate the ethics of removing artifacts from shipwrecks. When is it proper to take artifacts from wrecks? Are there circumstances under which artifacts should never be disturbed? Does your answer change if there are human remains onboard?

12. Chatterton seemed emotionally ready for the Rouses to identify the U-Who. But he seemed incapable of accepting the possibility of a "greenhorn" diver doing the same. Why?

13. Kohler gave up diving for two years in an effort to keep his family together. Can a person ever surrender his true passion and hope to live a happy and fulfilled life?

14. Did the discovery of the U-Who hasten Bill Nagle's demise?

15. Given the intentions of the crewmen aboard U-869 - to attack and kill Allied ships - do you think the book treated them too kindly?

1. I don't think there is anything I would give up my family for. My wife and kids are too important to me.
2. I respect their decision to not disturb the remains of the soldiers. I'm sure it wasn't an easy thing to do.
3. It would not have been worth it to me to lose my family over this. Maybe it was for them.
4. I think as they did more research into the soldiers, they came to know them as people not just as Nazis. They were just doing their jobs.
5. I do think the soldiers would have appreciated their work. I would want my family to know what happened to me.
6. I'm not sure what to think of the morality of diving the wreck after being told by the German government not to. On one had you would want to respect their wishes. It is the property of the German government. On the other hand, it's in American waters and has been abandoned for 50 years at this point.
7. I think I could love someone with differing political views, but it would have been difficult to love someone who is okay with the attempted genocide of an entire group of people.
8. Early in the war the submarines were much safer than the front lines. Later in the war it would have been hard for me to volunteer for a spot on a sub once the US had developed ways to track the subs.
9. I think Kohler did the right thing by going with Chatterton once he realized Chatterton was going through with the plan with or without him. He might as well give any help that he could.
10. I think he hated to see what had become of his friend Nagle. I do think he should have attended the funeral though out of respect for Nagle. I think he did say something to the effect of "That's not Bill Nagle. That's the man that killed him."
11. I'm not a diver so I've never really thought about the morality of removing artifacts from wrecks. Most of these have been lost for so long that I think it is okay. Maybe the owners of the wreck should have so many years to recover items and then after that it becomes free reign. I don't know.
12. I think Chatterton wanted somebody who was committed to diving, had the same passion for it as he, to identify the wreck.
13. This question is tough for me. I feel like I would do anything for my wife and kids. I think Kohler became so obsessed that his wife felt he couldn't do both diving and family. By that time it was too late for him to try and balance. This seems like something Kohler and his wife should have dealt with sooner in their marriage.
14. I don't know. It's possible that, like Chatterton and Kohler, he became obsessed with identifying the wreck but couldn't do anything about it so he drank himself to death.
15. I do think the book treated the crewmen a little more kindly than I expected. It humanized them, which isn't it a bad thing, but I feel it downplayed the fact that their goal was to kill Americans. Had they, and the Nazis, succeeded we'd be living in a much different world.

I started book late and just finished it last week. Great book, and I appreciated the thought-provoking questions.

i don't have kids, but in a general sense, my family is too important to risk it all.

The soldiers are dead, so I think you could explore remains and still be respectful. Their soul has departed, per se, if you believe in that,

I think the fact that their spouses didn't stand by them is evidence that they were not the right spouse for either of them.

My father was WWII navy, so these soldiers mission was to kill my father. Not him specifically, but navy ships. They should have been bothered by it more.

I think the soldiers would have appreciated the effort to give surviving family peace of mind.

Screw the German government, IF the sub is in american waters, which I understood it to be.

Could not love someone whose political beliefs were abhorrent to mine. Especially nazi beliefs.

I couldn't handle the conditons of a submarine. Too claustrophobic.

In retrospect, it turned out well that Kohler did not follow his first instincts. They made the discovery and lived to tell about it?

The funeral was not for the man he once knew and respected. I can understand that.

I guess I'm callous, but I don't see what the big deal is with removing the artifacts. And again, the poeple are dead. Why treat them like they're still alive?

A greenhorn discovering the identity would be an insult to their knowledge and, above all, their hard work and skill.

If a person doesn't follow his true passions, he can still experience happiness, but not true and fullfilling happiness.

I think maybe it ate away at Bill Nagle that he wasn't able to participate in the dives, so I would say it did hasten his death?

I'm torn on this one because, like I said, my father was wwII navy. Part of me says to hell with them, but i guess they were just doing their duty. I guess I considered all germans at that time to be nazis, but I guess that wasn't the case.

Lots of good questions--thanks Brent.

1) I would have to agree that family is a huge thing to risk. Short of creating a lasting world peace or something like that, I don't see myself being able to risk losing them.

2) I probably would do as they did as far as respecting the sailors.

4) I think it has to do with the nature of the killing during wartime. It's kind of how after the war, those on the opposing sides could share friendships and such. They recognize that they were all stuck in a bad spot--kill or be killed was the way of life during the war. They did their duty, but do not harbor any personal grudges.

5) I think it is important from a historical standpoint.

15) Not at all. As I mentioned in my answer to #4, they were charged to do a duty in service to their country. It's not like they had a lot of choice in the matter--they pretty much knew their fate going in.

I'll try to get to the ones I skipped at some later time--I've got a lot of stuff going on these days.

We should also think about the next group read--probably starting in the January time frame.