Kultus: a Novel

The cover of Kultus.  Cover design by
Guy Edwards of Bigfoot Lunch Club.

Author, teacher, and envelope-pusher Kirk Sigurdson has published his first fictional novel having to do with bigfoots entitled Kultus. I have read it cover to cover, and I thoroughly enjoyed the plot, characters, and message.  The setting is a slightly fictionalized Skamania County, WA in and around the Columbia River Gorge.  Kirk uses his knowledge and experience of bigfoots and the radical politics of logging to intertwine them into a story about conservation, land use, and passions.

Here is the blurb from Amazon about the book:
Jonathan Dewey Graham owns the largest stand of Pacific Rainforest in the United States. The Old Growth Resistance (OGRE) wants to stop him from logging on his own land by suing to classify it as a protected wilderness area. OGRE's campaign, funded in part by marijuana cultivation, hits a roadblock when forest giants (bigfoot) are discovered living in the ancient old growth forest. Ultimately, the precarious balance between landed gentry and environmental extremists comes to rest on the shoulders of a twelve year-old girl—Graham’s only child—who is befriended by a lone forest giant. The end result is both poignant and tragic. Kultus touches upon the universal nature of love, sentience, and the sustainability of resources in a world burdened with an ever-growing human population. Television personality, Cliff Barackman, calls this novel, "The riveting story of a metaphoric tug-of-war between lawyers, timber companies, land owners, hippies, and one young girl. Outside of these warring interests are the sasquatches whose ultimate fate depends on the outcome of the human wrangling." A surprising amount of research from the fields of anthropology and cryptozoology helps to enrich the story with realistic details. Like Upton Sinclair's, The Jungle, Kultus has the power to transform society for the better. Its social commentary about non-human intelligence is at once captivating, and also chilling.


I can highly recommend this book to any reader of bigfoot fiction. Being a teacher of literature, I can safely say that Kirk's writing style will not disappoint, and his imagination will live up to the same expectation.

Buy this book from Amazon by clicking this link.

The London Trackway - Track #66

London Track #66

Track number 66 from the London Trackway is one of the least clear casts due to the substrate from which it was obtained. At times, the ground was covered with a thick layer of moss and algae where the track maker walked. This cast was obtained from one of those mossy patches. The depth of the toes show clearly in the cast, but not much else.

For more on this cast, click this link.

New Dinosaur Species and Sasquatch

This is an illustration of Siats meekerorum.
(Credit: Artwork by Jorge Gonzales)

A new species of huge carnivorous dinosaur has been discovered here in North America.  While this is not a dinosaur blog, I found it interesting that this new species has been dubbed Siats meekerorum.  The name was derived from Siats, the giant, humanoid, cannabalistic monsters from Ute mythology.

The Ute tribe are Native Americans who traditionally inhabited the Great Basin, though now they now are mostly found in Utah and Colorado.  They tell stories of giant, trickster humanoids that are called Siats (females were called Bapets) who would kidnap children.  The females would force the children to nurse from their breasts, poisoning and killing them.  They would then eat the children after they were dead.  Siats and Bapets were thought to be nearly immortal, though they could be killed with obsidian arrows or spears.  

We know that nearly every Native tribe in North America has bogey man stories such as these.  It is thought that many (if not all) of them derive from sasquatches sharing the lands with the Native people.  Now, the Ute Siat has transcended mammalianhood and has had its name bestowed on a reptilian monster.  

For more on monsters in Native cultures, and their possible connection to sasquatches, check out Kathy Strain's excellent book by clicking this link.  

Sanderson Inscription to Jerry Crew

Sanderson's inscription to Jerry Crew

While filming volume two of Bigfoot Road Trip, I was treated by seeing (and holding and caressing) many lost treasures of bigfoot history.  Among them was this little gem.

Ivan T. Sanderson gave Jerry Crew a copy of his book, Abominable Snowmen: Legend Come to Life.  Sanderson was kind enough to write a short, personalized inscription into the inside cover the book, which Jerry kept safe over the years (though a little water damage and time has taken their toll).

Sanderson and Crew knew each other well, and considered each other friends.  Besides this book, there were letters from the men to each other, as well as other relics from the history of bigfooting.  Many of these will be showcased for the very first time with the release of Bigfoot Road Trip, Volume 2, expected to be released this summer.