For this Blog Hop, Shannon requests we post one of the following, followed by her book info:
1. Your favorite urban legend
2. Your favorite old wives' tale
3. Something scary that occurred in real life and taught you an important lesson
I don't know much about old wives tales - they usually have some moral lesson involved (boring); and I've had lots of scary situations that did not result in a learned life lesson. Unless that life lesson is "I'm lucky, I survived!) But I do have a favorite urban legend.
Since childhood, anything about Sasquatch interests me - but not in a scary way. I live in Northern California, in the mountains and forests. Recently I moved to the actual foothills, outside the populated urban areas, and so my chances of seeing a Big Foot should have increased from less-than-nil to a-definite-possibility.
According to this historical article, The California version of the Bigfoot Legend has its origins in 1958, with a letter sent to Andrew Genzoli of the Humboldt Times, from several Redding CA loggers who discovered " mysteriously large footprints." The article states "Genzoli said that he’d simply thought the mysterious footprints “made a good Sunday morning story.” But it caught the interest of locals, then the National Media, and finally Hollywood. Ever seen the 1987 movie HARRY AND THE HENDERSONS?
Well, my quasi-belief in the huge, shaggy, Wild Man is not so environmentally friendly - I do like horror stories after all. I see him (them) as tricksters, vandals, and predators; but not sexual predators. Unless they have a taste for beer or whiskey, I don't see the Sasquatch race being attracted to us puny, hairless humans. Except as food. Even a bear will chase, catch, play with, and eat a human if they are hungry or angry enough. I've scientific articles that state humans are not tasty to eat. I wouldn't know as I've never been hungry enough to eat human flesh. With the Corona Virus, and the potential for pandemic death, and the end of civilization as we know it, the Zombie Apocalypse could change my menu preferences. Ya just never know, ya know?
As recently as July 2014, Zoologist Dan Brown was guest speaker at the Lake Oroville, CA, Visitor's Center, drawing a crowd of 160 locals (source), and claims to have personally witnessed, and collected evidence of a Big Foot sighting in the area. In his speech he says "I have actually spotted the animal outside of Oroville with my own eyes." In his speech he goes on to say; "You know, in 1969 on Table Mountain, 11 people saw Bigfoot," he said. "And off of Black Bart Road also. Some people on the lake had sighting, while they're on the lake, seeing it on the shore." Brown also brought with him alleged castings of the elusive animal's feet.
Well, I'm convinced. My husband is an avid watcher of the program on Discovery or AMC or some such, that deals with Mountain Monsters. The Dudes spent some time in NorCal, Redding and Siskiyou County, and it was fun to watch these guys chasing a Thing they called a Big Foot. They had infrared blips, obscure tree knocking sounds, and blury distance views of a being they considered Sasquatch. They even had an episode (though not in NorCal) of some rednecks that claim they shot, killed, and buried a Big Foot. Sadly, none of them remembered exactly where they buried the evidence of their kill; they were drunk and high on the hunt, and scared shitless they'd be arrested for murder, so nobody can pinpoint exactly where the Boys hid the body.
As recently as July 2014, Zoologist Dan Brown was guest speaker at the Lake Oroville, CA, Visitor's Center, drawing a crowd of 160 locals (source), and claims to have personally witnessed, and collected evidence of a Big Foot sighting in the area. In his speech he says "I have actually spotted the animal outside of Oroville with my own eyes." In his speech he goes on to say; "You know, in 1969 on Table Mountain, 11 people saw Bigfoot," he said. "And off of Black Bart Road also. Some people on the lake had sighting, while they're on the lake, seeing it on the shore." Brown also brought with him alleged castings of the elusive animal's feet.
Well, I'm convinced. My husband is an avid watcher of the program on Discovery or AMC or some such, that deals with Mountain Monsters. The Dudes spent some time in NorCal, Redding and Siskiyou County, and it was fun to watch these guys chasing a Thing they called a Big Foot. They had infrared blips, obscure tree knocking sounds, and blury distance views of a being they considered Sasquatch. They even had an episode (though not in NorCal) of some rednecks that claim they shot, killed, and buried a Big Foot. Sadly, none of them remembered exactly where they buried the evidence of their kill; they were drunk and high on the hunt, and scared shitless they'd be arrested for murder, so nobody can pinpoint exactly where the Boys hid the body.
Big Foot, aka Sasquatch, is not to be confused by the other, older legend of The Dark Watchers known to haunt the Central/Coastal Valley along the Santa Lucia Mountain Range. Sightings of The Dark Watchers date back to "Spanish explorers making their way to the California Coast." (source) The Dark Watchers are described as:
very tall humanoid entities ranging in height from 7 feet tall all the way up to around 15 feet tall, dressed all in black and wearing flowing cloaks and wide brimmed hats, with many sightings also mentioning some sort of staves or sticks in the beings’ hands. Facial features are not typically seen, and they are almost always silent, enigmatic figures usually seen at a distance up on ridges silhouetted against the darkening twilight sky, always at around dusk or dawn, quietly looking over and surveying their domain with unknowable purpose and often vanishing in the blink of an eye, especially if one is to try and draw closer.I live in Oroville, under part of the Sierra Nevada Mountain Range - a few miles south of South Table Mountain. (Table Mountain, and the cascading Buttes to the south east coast line, were formed by the giant Paul Bunyan sitting down to lunch. He chopped off the top of a mountain to form his table, and his blue ox Babe formed the Sacramento Valley while snuggling out a nitch for a nap.) any local legends and tragedies abound in the local bookstores. I think if I were to write them in an anthology it could look a lot like Stephen King's fictional town of Castle Rock, Main. Someday, maybe . . when I'm not working 60 hours a week. But Big Foot is my favorite; and our plan is to set up a digital camera pointing at the downhill creek area of our property in hopes of catching our own distant, blury, mobile figure of Sasquatch to sell to the tabloids for our 15 seconds of fame.
Don't laugh; it could happen!
Thanks Shannon for giving me this opportunity to expose my favorite Urban Legend in my home town. I wish you luck in your book launch.
Title: Bruised Souls & Other Torments: Short Stories
Author: Shannon Lawrence
Amazon pre-order link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B085N7YCZ3
The Kindle e-book will be live Friday. The paperback *should* be. It will hit Smashwords and everywhere they distribute within the next week.
Blurb:
Fear resides in the soul.
A welcoming widow with a twisted appetite; a war-time evil lurking behind the face of a child; a father’s love gone horribly wrong; a deadly government solution; a new job with a demonic pay scale; a woman trapped in a mysterious house with no memory of who she is or how she got there. These are a mere glimpse of the terrors that lie in wait in this collection of horror short stories, sure to grip the psyche and torment the soul.
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Amazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/Shannon-Lawrence/e/B00TDKPOAO/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_5
