American Monsters: A History of Monster Lore, Legends, and Sightings in America

You can imagine my unbridled excitement on opening a book about American ghost stories. I’m a huge supernatural fan.<br /><br />Now imagine I run across an entry about MY tribe, where the name is attributed to another tribe and our history is pretty much erased.<br /><br />I was originally very excited to read this book, but was sorely disappointed. I am a Native American, Mvskoke Creek, to be exact. My ancestors traveled on the trail of tears from Tukabachee, Alabama to Tulsa, Oklahoma. I've heard the stories about Omv Uekatcv, the water panther and Hcinto Sakto, the Horned Serpent. I grew up with stories about Isti Papa, the man eater and Pasekolv, the trickster. They are real to me. These are my gods and my stories.<br /><br />It is really frustrating and upsetting to me when non-natives try to write about our culture and completely screw it up. In the book, Godfrey talks about the origins of Tulsa, of MY people, and credits it to the Cree tribe. The Cree live in the Northern US and Canada. The CREEK (which is the name the WHITE settlers gave to us by the way. Our name is Mvskoke, Muskogee or Muscogee..all spellings are accepted), MY people, are the ones who settled in Tulsa. The 'Wi Katca' as she calls it (a misspelling because I can only assume a simple google search got her this information) is the Omv Uekatcv, and is a sacred deity to our people. As many of the 'monsters' she describes in this book actually are.<br /><br />When writing about 'Native American Monsters' people really need to actually go the the source and ask a real life native from that tribe about the information. Because google entries are often written by non-natives who have no fricking clue what they are talking about. I could not buy this book or even continue reading it after this part because I was so upset. To have my culture sited and then disrespected by the lack of research made me feel gross.<br /><br />If you are Native, you may want to steer clear of this book. I am sure the entry on my tribe is not the only incorrect information in there. Disgusting.<br /><br />If you want 'native american ghost stories', go to the source. Never go to a white person for something they know nothing about...

the united states of monsters<br>the united monsters of america<br><br><img src="https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/hostedimages/1650298383i/32825218._SX540_.jpg" class="gr-hostedUserImg" loading="lazy"><br><br><img src="https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/hostedimages/1650298383i/32825219._SX540_.jpg" class="gr-hostedUserImg" loading="lazy"> <br><br><img src="https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/hostedimages/1650298383i/32825217._SX540_.jpg" class="gr-hostedUserImg" loading="lazy"><br><br>which one is your fav? i love all of them, la llorona, wendigo, especially those humanoid ones are my preference

I completely misunderstood this book. I bought it after reading a - well, not a <i>review</i>, exactly, but a summary, I guess, on a blog I follow. And I somehow got the impression that this was an analysis of belief in monsters in America. As in, sociologically, what function do these folk beliefs have. And what do the 'monsters' represent to us, that their myths are so persistent.<br /><br />Welp, I'm a doofus, and the book is nothing like this (check the fucking GR listing before you buy books, Emma.) It's a straightforward collection of monster sightings, culled, generally, from previously published collections of such stories. Godfrey states once or twice that she tried to contact an eyewitness for a followup, but couldn't, for one reason or another. <br /><br />So this leaves me all at sea in reviewing it. I don't believe 'monsters' exist, although I believe people can genuinely think they saw something strange, or even inexplicable. This book certainly wouldn't change my mind about this.<br /><br />The inexplicable part about the book, for me, is why there are no photographs. E.g. on page 57 Godfrey talks about a photo of a "Batsquatch," and says "the photo was included with the post at the URL noted in the above citation". The endnote gives the following URL: <a target="_blank" rel="noopener nofollow" href="http://biofort.blogspot.co.nz/2006/10/yet-another-1970s-giant-bird-witness.html">http://biofort.blogspot.co.nz/2006/10...</a><br /><br />you will notice there is no photo on this post. Even if there were, are we saying Godfrey's form of "investigation" is trawling blogs looking for random accounts of sightings to regurgitate? It's not entirely . . . rigorous, perhaps?<br /><br />I'm not rating, as I'm not the market for this book.

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I want to believe!! I don't believe in cryptids, as in <i>They actually exist and they're among us, just hiding REAL well</i> (especially when well-known ones like the Loch Ness monster have been debunked hard), but I like to believe there may be something.... more than us, bigger than us.<br /><br />I loved all the stories about people's recollections of encounters. Whether they can be explained or not (for example, one of the Bigfoot stories, the one about seeing a creature having killed your chickens/ running after it/ then coming back to find the chickens gone could have clearly been chicken-stealing, suit-wearing humans; stranger things have happened than humans concocting a ridiculous plan like that), or whether they're fabricated or not (there's never proof about any of the encounters, either the creature was too fast or the person was oh-so-conveniently not carrying a camera with them, even in stories in the 2010s), I still LOVE reading (and being told) an unexplained encounter/ folklore creature/ urban legend story.<br /><br />I gave the book a basic 3 stars because I enjoyed reading it, but it's nothing lifechanging or super well-researched, and nothing I'm going to revisit again in the future. It's fun to read in small chunks when you want a break from the other things you're reading, and you shouldn't think too hard about it, but that's about it.

I picked this up on a whim because it made me think of a novel I wrote for Nanowrimo several years ago that was going to involve a creature like the Jersey Devil. Unfortunately, the Jersey Devil segment took only a couple pages of this book. The book was separated into sections for each type of monster. You had creatures from the air (bird men, dinosaurs, chupacabras, and other flying beasts), water (giant squids, lake monsters, gatormen, etc.), and land (werewolves or "dogmen," cat-like creatures, and Bigfoot).<br /><br />For the most part, these were very brief overviews of a variety of sightings loosely grouped based on their characteristics. Only a few of the sightings had any depth. Toward the end I began skimming... most of the creatures I wasn't really interested in. There was some tie-in to Native American and South American mythology.<br /><br />I guess I was hoping for more historical accounts of monsters in American (like the Jersey Devil). This was largely recent encounters. I was also hoping perhaps for some illustrations or something.

3 1/2 stars

I was disappointed with this book as a long time reader and fan of Monster lore ( over 30 years of reading it). There is a lot of filler material pulled from other publications(with credit), and not enough eye witness accounts . She does not strictly stay in America either, though this book is supposed to be about American Monster Lore. Now I understand she is delving in to the history of a particular monster, so she writes about its origins. That is fine. But then she goes on to relate a experience from another country with said monster that does not take place in the US then I start to wonder if this writer has anything new and fresh. She didn't. The writing is dull and I fell like I was slogging along at a snail's pace,instead of what I usually feel when I read about Monster lore ( excited, curious wonder) .<br /> But I will say, for the first time reader of the subject of monsters this might be a well rounded book and overview of the subject. For others who are well versed in global and native monster stories you might be more of a mind like me and think," There are no new monsters in this book for me, wah."

Sorry but no. No no no.<br />With this type of book I think the writer either takes the serious route and questions the "monster" sightings and tries to give a scientifically established analysis of the facts given to her and when all has been ruled out gives in to the possibility of the supernatural, or she takes it very lighthearted and goes the slightly humorous path. Yet Godfrey is extremely serious without even thinking of questioning any of the eye-witness reports. Reports that according to her gain more credibility when a witness does not listen to metal music, observes weird lights in sky the same place he saw a creature or a sighting is proven good omen when the witness has something significant happening to shortly after. Sorry, no, to me this is not entertaining but at first silly and then plain frustration to read. I skim-read further and learned that a weird looking kangaroo-ish animal is naturally a gargoyle. I am out.<br />Plus, her writing is extremely dull, too.<br />I do admit my low rating is more my attitude towards such type of journalism than the book's fault but since my rating reflects my judgement and my enjoyment there is nothing but 1* to give.

This book is mildly entertaining and the sheer breadth of creatures and eyewitness accounts discussed make it interesting enough to read through. But this book isn't really a "history," doesn't really analyze most of the accounts it shares (beyond wild theorizing as to what the creatures could be, if not exactly what the witnesses report), and ultimately doesn't have much to say about cryptid lore in American culture beyond "there's probably monsters out there"<br /><br />Where it really falls flat, however - and what damages the author's reputation as a researcher enough that I'm not interested in her other books now - is the dismissive and colonized view the book takes of indigenous lore and culture. The author never cites or quotes sources from the actual Native nations whose lore she is discussing, preferring instead accounts written by white colonizers. I truly learned more from a single tiktok by an Anishanaabe woman about the Great Lakes monsters than in that entire chapter of this book. The author cites Native culture to further her own viewpoints and narrative of cryptid lore, and does not treat those rich cultural histories with anything like the respect they are owed. <br /><br />Ultimately this book was a good way to kill time and engage the imagination, but worth very little for the study of folklore.