The sharkers -- A stormy tribe -- Ambushed at sea -- Search and no rescue -- Adrift -- Hunter gatherers -- A fight for life -- Swimming with sharks -- Encounters with a whale -- On the road to nowhere -- A year at sea -- Another slow death -- The rooster -- Who is this wild man? -- Found but lost -- Ambushed by cockroaches -- Call of the sea -- Author's afterword -- Note on time and mapping -- Note on translations and profanities -- Acknowledgments

The miraculous account of the man who survived alone and adrift at sea longer than anyone in recorded history. For fourteen months, Alvarenga survived constant shark attacks. He learned to catch fish with his bare hands. He built a fish net from a pair of empty plastic bottles. Taking apart the outboard motor, he fashioned a huge fishhook. Using fish vertebrae as needles, he stitched together his own clothes. Based on dozens of hours of interviews with Alvarenga and interviews with his colleagues, search and rescue officials, the medical team that saved his life and the remote islanders who nursed him back to health, this is an epic tale of survival. Print run 75,000