Joey Madia, New Mystics Reviews

   (Chicago: Bird Mountain Books, 2022). ISBN: 9798848732122 It is not a stretch to say that Mothman is presently the most popular cryptid—bigger than Nessie, Bigfoot, and Dogman. It would also not be a stretch to posit that the collapse of the Silver Bridge, connecting Point Pleasant, West Virginia to Gallipolis, Ohio, until it fell within minutes on December 15, 1967 (killing 46 people), is the most tragic in U.S. history. It spurred President Johnson to form a highway commission and change the frequency and process by which bridges are inspected. Consider for a moment that these disparate events (despite persistent lore) happened in the course of almost exactly 13 months (starting with the first Mothman sightings around November 15, 1966) in the same tiny town of 6,000. No wonder Point Pleasant is almost mythical and certainly magical in bringing tens of thousands of visitors each year to its stuck-in-time Main Street and nearby McClintic Wildlife Management Area (aka t...

A Review of John A. Keel: The Man, The Myths, and The Ongoing Mysteries , by Brent Raynes (Available on Amazon and from the author, 2019). ISBN 978-1-0790-1450-1 If you are interested in the paranormal—whether it be UFOs, cryptids, or poltergeist and haunting phenomena—chances are good that you know the name John A. Keel. A journalist turned paranormal investigator and author of some of the foundational works in the field (including perhaps his most famous— The Mothman Prophecies ), Keel was cutting edge and controversial. To fully appreciate his complexity, Brent Raynes—a life-long investigator, publisher, and podcast host—delivers a text that is part biography and part survey of the areas that Keel was studying and the prevalent investigators who are still carrying on that work. I found this approach to be refreshing and appropriate given who Keel was, and, as stated in the subtitle, the “ongoing mysteries” that survive him in death. It is also an opportunity for the reader to a...

(New Milford, CT: Visionary Living, Inc., 2018). ISBN: 9781942157311 As a reviewer, this book is a perfect storm for me. I have been fortunate to have been mentored by the lead author, and she has recently become my publisher for the paranormal research I do with my wife and other investigators. The methods and experiences in this book are things that I know firsthand. I am also familiar with Greene County, PA, having friends who live there. I can attest to its remoteness, feeling of being out-of-time (including a certain road we used to travel where—especially at night—it felt like time stretched and we were on it way longer than we should be), and I have heard stories for many years about their encounters with ghosts, UFOs, and possible parallel dimensions. Kevin Paul is a life-long resident of Greene County and his family goes back to the earliest European settlers in the area. This gives him intimate knowledge and a level of trust with the locals. Greene County’s story, ...

By Chad Lewis, Noah Voss, and Kevin Lee Nelson (Eau Claire, WI: On the Road Publications, 2013). ISBN: 978-0982431467 Thanks in large part to horror films and cable “reality” paranormal shows, the immense amount of time and effort legitimate paranormal investigators spend in libraries and historical societies chasing down leads is largely ignored. Most people are only interested in the “sexy” aspects of the haunting or cryptid visitation—who got chased, frightened, possessed, or injured? What dark menace is lurking in the corner? Are there “jump scares” as the investigators walk insane asylum hallways in the green glow of night-vision technology? Viewers don’t realize that paranormal investigators are in large part journalists and historians, tracking down the history that provides the context for the paranormal phenomena at play. One of the world’s best known paranormal investigators was John Keel, of Mothman fame. He was also a journalist. So was his counterpart in the film Th...

(Newburyport, MA: New Page Books, 2017). ISBN: 9781632651129 In June 2009, two photo-shopped images of a “made up” entity dubbed “ the Slenderman” were uploaded to the Internet as part of a contest. The creator used as inspiration such well-known horror/paranormal tropes as the Men in Black (MIBs), the tentacled creatures of H.P. Lovecraft’s tales, and the Mothman—all of which have been a part of my life as a paranormal researcher, content creator, and experiencer for the past 10 years. Within weeks, the Slenderman was jumping its frame as a made up monster and appearing in the woods, bedrooms, and computers of people all over the world, culminating in several high-profile murders and attacks in which Slenderman was professed to be the inspiration. By the time of these events, Slenderman was the subject of hundreds if not thousands of short stories and graphic images on the Internet, at horror websites such as 4chan and Creepypasta Wiki. This phenomenon is complex, with many str...

 (New Brunswick, NJ: Global Communications/Conspiracy Journal). ISBN: 9781606112489 Over the past few years, there have been dozens of documented sightings of flying humanoids over the city of Chicago, IL, reigniting interest among the general public in this phenomena, which has been a part of human art and culture since the earliest civilizations up through the well-known Mothman sightings on the Ohio River in the late 1960s. I am what is referred to among crypto-zoologists and paranormal investigators as an “experiencer,” as is my wife. In August 2009, while exploring outside of Point Pleasant, WV, where the Mothman was first seen, we saw a flying humanoid cross the road in front of us. Since that time, we have also witnessed interdimensionals. All of these experiences are detailed in our upcoming book from Visionary Living. I grew up at the Jersey Shore, near the fabled Pine Barrens, home of another winged cryptid—the Jersey Devil. If you consider human fascination with...

 by Ken Gerhard (Woodbury, MN: Llewellyn, 2013). ISBN: 978-0-7387-3720-1 The field of cryptozoology, which many consider a pseudoscience, involving the search for and study of “hidden animals” such as Bigfoot, is one that is equal parts fascinating and controversial. In the age of Reality Television (which we all know often has little to do with “reality”), there is a vast array of shows in which cryptozoologists and their teams go out into the woods and other undeveloped geographical areas in search of creatures from the Mothman to the Owlman to the Chupacabra. For those who follow this field, names like John Keel, Loren Coleman, and Stan Gordon dominate, although there is a younger, very hip group of cryptozoologists out there, doing field research, and gathering reports and doing interviews with witnesses of a plethora of sightings, all over the world. Having witnessed a few unexplainable entities, and having a number of good friends in the fields of cryptozoology and, ...

(Mister Herman’s Publishing Company, 2015, misterherman.com). ISBN: 978-0692428511 By Joey Madia In the novel Minor Confessions of an Angel Falling Upward , by Planner Forthright (which I was enlisted, against my better judgment, to edit some years ago), he writes “The most dangerous monsters … have no fangs or claws, drink no blood, live in Light, and fear no rosary or silver bullet symbols. … They wear lilac aprons and cook fresh okra in stain-proof, modern kitchens. Their names are recorded on a driver’s license and certificate of birth. They aren’t the swamp and coffin types. In certain tenuous moments they can be as sweetly consoling as the pie upon the sill.” This same broad-based approach to what constitutes a “monster” is part of what makes this collection of ten short stories so appealing. In an age of zombies, vampires, and comic book supervillains taking over the pages of print and terabytes of the digital film age, it is refreshing to sit with a set of well-told tale...

  (Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole Books, 2014), ISBN: 978-0-8117-1115-9 It’s always a pleasure to read and review a new Rosemary Ellen Guiley book. Not only are they based on interviews and fieldwork coupled with a thorough review of secondary sources; I have also had the privilege of accompanying her on several paranormal investigations, including on the three acres on which I live. Some of the experiences of my family have been chronicled in other of her books (e.g., on Ouija boards), and in this book on West Virginia hauntings, there’s a segment about the arts center my wife and I used to run.             These personal connections aside, as an author who often uses the supernatural in my stories, novels, and plays, my growing collection of Guiley’s books is an indispensible part of my research library.             The Big Book of West Virginia Ghost Stories , broke...

 (2011, Burning Bulb Publishing, ISBN:9780615535791, BurningBulbPublishing.com) By Joey Madia There are lots of West Virginias. To some it’s the redneck, backwards in-bred core of Appalachia. To others it is home to the powerhouse football and basketball teams of WVU (Go Mountaineers!), while, to legions of John Denver fans, it is “Almost Heaven,” an outdoor mecca of whitewater rafting, biking, and hiking. In the five years I’ve been here I’ve seen a little bit of all of these pictures of West Virginia, and many more. The frontier spirit is alive and well, as are lots of examples of innovation and the ongoing controversy over coal, natural gas, and “fracking.” I’ve also noticed in my time here that West Virginia fascinates writers, whether natives or transplants like myself. Sooner or later, you just have to write about the place. Rich Bottles Jr., a Pennsylvania native and “bizarro” author, is one of those whose fascination with all things West Virginia manifests...

(2021, Stackpole Books, www.stackpolebooks.com, $12.95, ISBN: 978-0-8117-1028-2) [Disclaimer: The final chapter of this book, “The Enchanted Holler,” details many of the paranormal experiences my family has had on our 3 acres in north central West Virginia. I will not be discussing this chapter in this review and I do not believe that this precludes me from making a fair judgment about the rest of the book. JM] There is an illustration going around Facebook recently that lists the qualifications of a Paranormal Researcher in the past as compared to now. As one can imagine, in this age of ready (but often questionable) Internet “data” and a glut of paranormal shows on cable television, anyone with a camcorder, an EMF meter (which a 10-year-old friend of my daughter’s recently got as a Christmas present), and some curiosity, what passes as a Researcher/Investigator is nowhere near as rigorous as it used to be. True professionals do the leg work—literally—traipsing the natural landscapes ...