Universally praised for its powerfully authentic depiction of submarine warfare, Run Silent, Run Deep was an immediate success when published in 1955 and shot to the top of best-seller lists. The New York Times said of it, "If ever a book had a ring of reality, this is it. . . combat passages rank with the most exciting written about any branch of the service." The Saturday Review called the book "a classic," and many reviewers compared its author to such greats as C.S. Forester and Erich Remarque. Today these accolades still ring true for Edward L. Beach's gripping first novel of American submariners confronting a formidable Japanese navy in a vicious battle to control the Pacific. Beach's taut and dramatic narrative, told with the intimacy of a confession, deals with two strong-headed men, Edward Richardson, the commander of the USS Walrus, and his executive officer, Jim Bledsoe, bound together by wartime duty, divided by jealousy, pride, and love for a beautiful woman. But long after the details of this famous novel fade from memory, what remains with us is a startling realization of the way it was, really was, in the silent service during World War II.

In a collision with a steamship, "City of Rome, on the night of September 25, 1925, the U.S. Navy Submarine S-51 sank in 132 feet of water, taking 33 sailors to the ocean floor. This is the story of the men charged with doing the impossible--rising the thousand ton sub from the bottom of the sea. Added to this modern classic of true adventure are a foreword and afterword giving specifics of the accident and the aftermath, additional photographs, a publisher's preface, and appendices.