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Neptune's Fortune

The Billion-Dollar Shipwreck and the Ghosts of the Spanish Empire

Author Julian Sancton
Hardcover
$33.00 US
| $44.00 CAN
Crown
On sale Jan 27, 2026 | 384 Pages | 9780593594179
Grades 9-12 + AP/IB
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The riveting true story of a legendary Spanish galleon that sunk off the coast of Colombia with over $1 billion in gold and silver—and one man’s obsessive quest to find it—from the New York Times bestselling author of Madhouse at the End of the Earth

Roger Dooley wasn’t looking for the San José. But an accidental discovery in the dusty stacks of a Spanish archive led him to the story of a lifetime, the tale of a great eighteenth-century treasure ship loaded with riches from the New World and destined for Spain. But that ship, the galleon San José, met a darker fate. It was drawn into a pitched battle with British ships of war off the coast of Cartagena, and when the smoke cleared, the San José and its bounty had disappeared into the ocean, its coordinates lost to time.

Though a diver at heart, Dooley was an unlikely candidate to find the San José. He had little in the way of serious credentials, yet his tenacity and single-minded devotion to finding and excavating the ship powered him across four decades, even as he became a man in exile from the country of his birth. As Dooley jousted with famous treasure hunters and well-funded competitors, he slowly homed in on a patch of sea that might contain a three-hundred-year-old shipwreck—or nothing at all.

Neptune's Fortune is a thrilling adventure, taking readers from great naval battles on the high seas to the sun-soaked shores that nurtured history’s most notorious treasure hunters, to the archives that held the secret keys to lost fortune on the ocean floor.
“Of all the prizes slumbering upon the world’s seabeds, no shipwreck has stirred more mystery, intrigue, or controversy than the galleon San Jose. In these briskly paced pages, Julian Sancton takes us from moldering Spanish archives to the murk of the Caribbean to tell the thrilling story of how one quixotic, eccentric, and thoroughly obsessed sleuth stubbornly defied the odds to locate this most legendary of underwater bounties. Neptune’s Fortune is about treasure and the subculture of treasure seekers, but more importantly, it reminds us of the deeper and more satisfying riches that come embedded within a splendid historical tale that’s been researched meticulously and told exceptionally well.”—Hampton Sides, New York Times bestselling author of The Wide Wide Sea

“Roaring with excitement, Neptune’s Fortune is a deeply reported adventure, a study in obsession, and a thoroughly engrossing read. Sancton writes in the fine tradition of great narrative nonfiction that transports the reader into private worlds and into marvelous larger-than-life characters.”—Susan Orlean, bestselling author of The Orchid Thief and The Library Book

“Sancton is a masterful storyteller, and he has struck gold—pun intended—with Neptune’s Fortune. Through extraordinary research across three continents and with a journalist’s eye for the telling detail, he has penned a rollicking tale of buccaneers, shady treasure hunters and sea battles both past and present. Readers are in for a rare treat.”—Scott Anderson, New York Times bestselling author of Lawrence in Arabia

“Neptune’s Fortune is a wonderful book, full of heroism, greed, piracy, sunken treasure, and adventure on the high seas. A wild, incredible story from beginning to end, with a central character straight out of Hemingway, it’s even more remarkable because it’s true.”—Eric Schlosser, New York Times bestselling author of Chew On This and Fast Food Nation

“For more than three centuries, the Spanish galleon San José remained a mystery, lost in battle and vanished in the pitiless deep ocean. Whoever located this shipwreck and its legendary treasure—among the many searching for it—would find their name etched in history. How fortunate for us that one man’s obsession with the San José led to its discovery, and that master storyteller Julian Sancton has chronicled this triumph. Neptune’s Fortune is a real-life drama, a maritime riddle, a swashbuckling adventure, and, above all, a riveting tale.”—Susan Casey, New York Times bestselling author of The Underworld
© Jess Levine
Julian Sancton is the New York Times bestselling author of Madhouse at the End of the Earth and a senior features editor at The Hollywood Reporter. His work has appeared in Vanity Fair, National Geographic, Esquire, The New Yorker, and GQ, among other publications. He has reported from every continent, including Antarctica, and lives in Larchmont, New York. View titles by Julian Sancton

About

The riveting true story of a legendary Spanish galleon that sunk off the coast of Colombia with over $1 billion in gold and silver—and one man’s obsessive quest to find it—from the New York Times bestselling author of Madhouse at the End of the Earth

Roger Dooley wasn’t looking for the San José. But an accidental discovery in the dusty stacks of a Spanish archive led him to the story of a lifetime, the tale of a great eighteenth-century treasure ship loaded with riches from the New World and destined for Spain. But that ship, the galleon San José, met a darker fate. It was drawn into a pitched battle with British ships of war off the coast of Cartagena, and when the smoke cleared, the San José and its bounty had disappeared into the ocean, its coordinates lost to time.

Though a diver at heart, Dooley was an unlikely candidate to find the San José. He had little in the way of serious credentials, yet his tenacity and single-minded devotion to finding and excavating the ship powered him across four decades, even as he became a man in exile from the country of his birth. As Dooley jousted with famous treasure hunters and well-funded competitors, he slowly homed in on a patch of sea that might contain a three-hundred-year-old shipwreck—or nothing at all.

Neptune's Fortune is a thrilling adventure, taking readers from great naval battles on the high seas to the sun-soaked shores that nurtured history’s most notorious treasure hunters, to the archives that held the secret keys to lost fortune on the ocean floor.

Reviews

“Of all the prizes slumbering upon the world’s seabeds, no shipwreck has stirred more mystery, intrigue, or controversy than the galleon San Jose. In these briskly paced pages, Julian Sancton takes us from moldering Spanish archives to the murk of the Caribbean to tell the thrilling story of how one quixotic, eccentric, and thoroughly obsessed sleuth stubbornly defied the odds to locate this most legendary of underwater bounties. Neptune’s Fortune is about treasure and the subculture of treasure seekers, but more importantly, it reminds us of the deeper and more satisfying riches that come embedded within a splendid historical tale that’s been researched meticulously and told exceptionally well.”—Hampton Sides, New York Times bestselling author of The Wide Wide Sea

“Roaring with excitement, Neptune’s Fortune is a deeply reported adventure, a study in obsession, and a thoroughly engrossing read. Sancton writes in the fine tradition of great narrative nonfiction that transports the reader into private worlds and into marvelous larger-than-life characters.”—Susan Orlean, bestselling author of The Orchid Thief and The Library Book

“Sancton is a masterful storyteller, and he has struck gold—pun intended—with Neptune’s Fortune. Through extraordinary research across three continents and with a journalist’s eye for the telling detail, he has penned a rollicking tale of buccaneers, shady treasure hunters and sea battles both past and present. Readers are in for a rare treat.”—Scott Anderson, New York Times bestselling author of Lawrence in Arabia

“Neptune’s Fortune is a wonderful book, full of heroism, greed, piracy, sunken treasure, and adventure on the high seas. A wild, incredible story from beginning to end, with a central character straight out of Hemingway, it’s even more remarkable because it’s true.”—Eric Schlosser, New York Times bestselling author of Chew On This and Fast Food Nation

“For more than three centuries, the Spanish galleon San José remained a mystery, lost in battle and vanished in the pitiless deep ocean. Whoever located this shipwreck and its legendary treasure—among the many searching for it—would find their name etched in history. How fortunate for us that one man’s obsession with the San José led to its discovery, and that master storyteller Julian Sancton has chronicled this triumph. Neptune’s Fortune is a real-life drama, a maritime riddle, a swashbuckling adventure, and, above all, a riveting tale.”—Susan Casey, New York Times bestselling author of The Underworld

Author

© Jess Levine
Julian Sancton is the New York Times bestselling author of Madhouse at the End of the Earth and a senior features editor at The Hollywood Reporter. His work has appeared in Vanity Fair, National Geographic, Esquire, The New Yorker, and GQ, among other publications. He has reported from every continent, including Antarctica, and lives in Larchmont, New York. View titles by Julian Sancton

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