I am delighted to say we have raised the bar as far as journalistic excellence. This post is filed by our newest Bigfoot Lunch Clubber--and yes, he know's the handshake. Hermon Joyner is a gifted professional writer/photographer reminding us what hack's we are. Hopefully we will be posting more from Hermon sooner than later. Without further ado...
At the Reading of Michael McLeod’s Anatomy of a Beast
Michael McLeod gave a reading at Powell’s Bookstore on Hawthorne St. in Portland, Oregon, last week on April 23rd, for his new book called Anatomy of a Beast. The subtitle of the book is “Obsession and Myth on the Trail of Bigfoot.” According to McLeod, this book isn’t so much an examination of the existence of Bigfoot, which he says is an absolute impossibility, but a look at the some of the people connected to the spreading of the Bigfoot myth, namely Roger Patterson.
As readings go, it was exceptionally dull for such an interesting subject. For a while, it seemed as if he was filibustering his own meeting, reading several random, seemingly endless, selections from the book, dragging out the time, so he wouldn’t have to answer or take questions from the audience. It was only after he started to take questions that things became interesting at all.
I found it somewhat ironic that he commented that people who believe in Bigfoot will look at any piece of evidence and never question it because they’ve already made up their minds as to whether Bigfoot exists. Yet McLeod said that even if the Patterson footage looks believable, it can’t be true because Bigfoot doesn’t exist—it’s just not possible. It seems like flipsides of the same coin to me.
While the book may be a good read—the bit I read in the bookstore seemed well written enough—McLeod’s own patronizing, dismissive take on the subject did nothing to encourage me to buy or read his book. No matter what you believe about Bigfoot, if you write a book about it, you should be prepared to have fun with it, especially in a public venue. No fun was to be had at that reading, though.
—Hermon Joyner
