Dive into the Dark and Turbulent Domain of Nessie, the World’s Most Supernatural Monster Deep in the black waters of Loch Ness lurks a long-necked, hump-backed monster that for centuries has fascinated those lucky―or unlucky―enough to see it. From the earliest sightings in 565 AD to the Nessie craze of the twentieth century, this creature has been steeped in the world of supernatural strangeness. Join Nick Redfern on an exciting journey into the paranormal origins of Nessie, exploring ideas that go far beyond the ordinary. This comprehensive guide offers lore, unique theories, hot spots, and photographs. Experience firsthand encounters, discover how Nessie is connected to the occult, and meet other mysterious monsters that live in Loch Ness. Nessie presents a fresh approach to the mystery, one that will take you down new and sometimes frightening paths as you hunt for the truth.
Nick Redfern is a British best-selling author, Ufologist and Cryptozoologist who has been an active advocate of official disclosure, and has worked to uncover thousands of pages of previously-classified Royal Air Force, Air Ministry and Ministry of Defence files on UFOs dating from the Second World War from the Public Record Office.
He has has appeared on a variety of television programmes in the UK and works on the lecture circuit, both in the UK and overseas, and has appeared in internationally syndicated shows discussing the UFO phenomenon. He is also a regular on the History Channel programs Monster Quest and UFO Hunters as well as National Geographic Channels's Paranormal and the SyFY channel's Proof Positive.
Redfern now lives in Texas and is currently working as a full-time author and journalist specializing in a wide range of unsolved mysteries, including Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, UFO sightings, government conspiracies, alien abductions and paranormal phenomena, and also works as a feature writer and contributing editor for Phenomena magazine and writes regularly for other magazines and websites.
In 2007 Universal Studios bought the rights to Redfern's book: "Three Men Seeking Monsters: Six Weeks in Pursuit of Werewolves, Lake Monster, Giant Cats, Ghostly Devil Dogs and Ape-Men" in the hopes of making a movie from it.
I received an e-ARC copy of this book through NetGalley and Llewellyn Worldwide, Ltd.
I would first like to state that I saw the title of this book and was intrigued. I did not then, nor do I now, hold any beliefs about what the Loch Ness Monster is. I simply saw a title, was curious, wanted to read the book, and my request was granted by the publisher.
At the beginning of the book I highlighted a statement by the author: "As my book shows, there is demonstrable evidence that the monsters of Loch Ness are of a definitively supernatural - rather than a flesh and blood - nature." That's a pretty darn strong statement which must be backed up by facts. But it was not backed up by anything other than the suppositions and beliefs of the author. When someone attempts to provide proof of anything paranormal they take on a very heavy burden of evidence which will, by its very nature, be open to interpretation on all sides.
Rick Redfern believes that there is not just one Nessie, but at least several Nessies and perhaps many supernatural creatures which have all fallen under the same name regardless of how different these creatures may appear to the humans seeing them. Creatures appearing both on land and in the waters of lakes in the Loch Ness region of Scotland. But, gosh darn it, nobody seems to have had a camera handy in order to have at least photographic evidence of these land or air sightings. Even a blurry, over exposed picture would be better than nothing, but no, nothing like proof for the weirdness walking around in the woods or flying around in the skies. The author's answer to this is that these creatures are paranormal and they can freeze a person in their tracks to such an extent they totally forget to take a picture. Even in the rare cases when a photograph does exist of Nessie the paranormal aspect reaches down into the postal service or a newspaper office and makes the evidence disappear.
I could go on about how poorly the book is written from a literary standpoint, but there really isn't any reason to. Mr. Redfern stated that he could prove his statement, but Mr. Redfern did not come anywhere close to doing that. Just believing something yourself does not automatically translate into evidence or proof. One very curious thing was revealed in this book, though, the fact that the author went with his parents on a trip to Loch Ness when he was a young boy - about 7 or 8 years old if I remember correctly. Where is the information in this book regarding personal experiences this author has had in exploring this Loch Ness Monster phenomenon? Descriptions of personal experiences would have at least lent some validity to the author's argument.
I remain completely unchanged in my belief of what the Loch Ness monster actually is - I simply don't know. I can say that reading this book gave me quite a few chuckles along the way even though I'm sure they were unintended so in that way it was not a complete waste of my time.
As the book title clearly suggests, this book looks at the possible supernatural aspects of the Loch Ness Monster. It is different than any other book I read about Loch Ness. Not quite sure he convinced me but it was an interest read.
When I saw Nessie on Netgalley, I was intrigued. I read Nick Redfern’s previous books Chupacabra Road Trip, and gave it 4 stars. In that book, I thought the author did an admirable job of getting to the bottom of the mystery, providing both plausible, scientific and less plausible, supernatural, explanations for the origins of the Chupacabra. I also really enjoyed reading about the author’s own investigation visiting the “crime scenes” where the chupacabra had hurt animals, and talking to locals.
I expected something similar from Nessie. A run-down of historical research, the author’s own investigation on site, talking to the locals and some other Nessie specialists, and offering a wide range of explanations, from the plausible to the less plausible.
Unfortunately, the author lost me almost right from the start. He focuses on the regular explanations (Nessie being a dinosaur, some type of unknown animal, and so on) for a very brief timespan, maybe a chapter at most, and then jumps straight into the supernatural. It’s not even that I mind the supernatural as an explanation for Nessie – it’s that I doubt it’s the only possible one. Also, the book goes into so many different directions, always jumping back to names mentioned chapters prior, and telling stories that have little, or nothing to do with Nessie.
For example, the author devotes several chapters to Alastair Crowley, who spent some time in a house near Loch Ness, yet only said one or two things about Nessie – yet the author thinks this warrants a lot of page time, in regards to the Nessie investigation. There’s also mention of several other wizards/ warlocks, similar to Crowley, who may or may not have had anything to do with Loch Ness.
The author likes to explain everything away by blaming it on the supernatural. You can’t take a decent photograph of Nessie? Must be paranormal. Nessie appears different to several people? Must be a) there’s several Nessies and b) it’s paranormal. The list goes on and on. The author also refers to high-strangeness, and to how some people’s lifes were forever influenced after they investigated Nessie, as if something paranormal warned them to stay away.
Then there’s also a chapter on UFO’s, men in black, and really, there’s no end to all the strangeness mentioned in the book. It was over the top. Is Nessie paranormal now, or is she an alien?
I expected this book would debunk some theories regarding Nessie, and investigate some other theories, or the author’s own theory, but it focuses primarily on the paranormal theory, and hardly tries to debunk the others. After reading it, I don’t know much more than I did before – I still don’t know what Nessie is, but my money is still on a prehistoric monster / animal we simply haven’t encountered yet, rather than a paranormal shape-shifting kelpie.
I chose this book expecting it to be a takedown of the many bizarre theories and explanations surrounding the supposed Loch Ness monster. Instead, it posits an even more bizarre theory: that Nessie is of supernatural origin, and that there may be many of the creatures dwelling in Scotland. The book uses very flowery language and laboured expressions, almost as if to increase the word count. The author quotes Wikipedia rather than whatever source Wikipedia uses, and he seems unaware of the concept of an offline encyclopaedia. The writing is, technically speaking, rather poor, with words joined by hyphens where they are not normally, such as "high-strangeness" and "monster-film". Measurements are given in alternating feet and metres, seemingly arbitrarily. I found the information about Aleister Crowley interesting, and he reappears throughout the book. His London residence, a grand townhouse, was next door to a building I worked in for several years, and I knew a little about him already, but not of a Loch Ness connection. However, as with much of the book, the source material is disputed at best: a wiki-based website is given as the fount of Crowley information. There is at least one completely false, if minor, assertion in the book - that UK Prime Minister Tony Blair was "voted out of office in 2007", the implication being this was due to a curse by one Kevin Carlyon. Blair was not voted out; after long speculation he announced in May 2007 that he would step down the following month, which he did. If this kind of basic, undeniable fact is presented falsely by the author, then one has to ask if anything in the work is credible at all. At the very least, I give the book one star, because it did give me a few giggles at the utter nonsense of it all. */*****
Subtitle: Exploring the Supernatural Origins of the Loch Ness Monster
If you ever watch any of the shows on History Channel, the Travel Channel, or other cable networks about UFOs, cryptids, and the paranormal then you’ve probably seen Nick Redfern at least once. Recently when I was searching our library’s online card catalog for books on those topics, several came up that were written by him. Including this one.
Redfern’s premise in this book is that Nessie may not be just a flesh and blood creature, it may be linked to supernatural activity. He goes back to the very first mention of the monster when St. Columba encountered it in about 565 A.D. and invoked the name of God to defeat it. The author also explored the legend of the Kelpie, which were purported to like in multiple lochs throughout Scotland.
The infamous Aleister Crowley comes into play in Nessie’s story more than once, having purchased a rumored haunted/cursed house on the Loch. I was surprised that the book avoided any mention of the death of speedboat racer John Cobb on Loch Ness in 1952. One other interesting thing Refern points out is the tendency of cameras and other electronic equipment to fail when Nessie appears; this same thing often happens at Skinwalker Ranch as well.
I gave Nessie four stars on Goodreads. It put many of the news items about the creature during my childhood in a new light and proposed new theories that I hadn’t considered previously.
Nick has pulled together the best read on Bessie here. He always offers an interesting angle on whatever he writes about. My faves of his are the early boos of himself and Nate going monster hunting around Britain - I felt like if hone with him on the adventure!
Very comprehensive exploration of the whole Loch Ness mystery. Redfern is one of my favourite authors in this field, I really appreciate how he doesn’t cherry pick data to fit a hypothesis & includes all the high strangeness aspects too. His conversational writing style is fun & accessibile. I learnt a lot listening to this one. I wish he’d narrate his own audiobooks though, seems strange to have an American coming out with some of the idiosyncratic Black Country expressions. A minor thing though. Highly recommend
I've been a Loch Ness Monster fan since junior high. I would spend my lunches reading about Nessie's legends. So when I saw that a new book about Nessie was available, I requested a copy. I found the connections between Nessie and kelpies to be fascinating to think about. The idea that there isn't just one monster in Loch Ness, but an entire species was a lot of fun to think about.
I even got to read some new stories and see some new photos. As much as I love Nessie, I'm not much of a researcher on the topic. So Redfern's retelling of a lot of the stories of Nessie, as well as the legends of kelpies and wyrms, really kept my attention. I really do enjoy new takes on these kinds of legends and Redfern really delivers on that.
The last quarter of the book, or so, kinda lost me. It may be that I've been blessed to not have had many interactions with real magic or it may be that I felt Redfern was pushing me to his conclusions, but I found myself continuously thinking that many of the things he was talking about weren't that supportable. A number of the connections Redfern makes requires a belief in things that I don't subscribe to, so, naturally, I had problems keeping my interest up in the last parts of the book. I don't argue that Nessie could be a kelpie. I don't argue that Nessie could be supernatural. I even agree with Redfern that the plesiosaur theory is unsupportable. But, it seems to me, that the magical attempts to get a good look at Nessie are about as successful as the technological attempts.
Overall, I loved reading all the new stories about Nessie and Scottish kelpies. Legends of heroes fighting wyrms and giant worms. But if you're not a full believer in all things supernatural (i.e. sorcerers, UFOs) you may find the ending of the book to be more frustrating than anything.
Nessie, beloved Loch Monster of Scotland, a mystery that most of us DON'T want solving, why? because we all LOVE a mystery..Right? Nick Refern's book is interesting, , and fun to read. According to Nick, he thinks there are more than one beast n the Loch, and they are 'Shape shifters, , this is the reason for not always seeing them/ it. Is Nessie a supernatural being? or a giant Eel or Pike? It can't be a Plesiosaur, as these creatures, couldn't hold their head's up like the famous pictures would have you believe. So if not a long lost dinosaur, ,what is lurking in the Loch Ness? Nick has many suggestions, some do seem plausible, others verging on the ridiculous. But whatever you thing, Nessie is a compelling read, fun too.
The Loch Ness Monster has been surrounded by supernatural phenomena for over a thousand years. Recently it has been investigated solely as a cryptozoological creature. This books seeks to explore the more paranormal aspects of Nessie. Full of fascinating encounters and experiences that cover centuries of interactions. Witches, warlocks, Men in Black, UFOs and spirits are analyzed in regards to the sitings. My only complaint is it could use more photographs and illustrations - it’s frustrating when the author is describing a photograph or film clip without any corresponding graphic. Otherwise it is highly recommended for those interested in alternative theories on what is happening in the dark waters of Loch Ness, Scotland.
Nick Redfern has written a book that includes almost every bit of information he could find about Nessie. However, the chatty writing style isn't particularly coherent, with mulitple jumping around the time line and refering to people he had already mentioned or was going to mention later on in the book. The author also fails to provide satisfactory proof for his hypothesis, though the idea is interesting. The lack of illustrations/photographs in the books, especially when the author refers to them, is annoying. The book is interesting with new (to me) information, but flawed.
I am not a fan of diving into the occult and supernatural. I did have my doubts once I began reading this book and some of the passages were a bit...conjuring of that certain air of darkness. I read this book exclusively in Sunlight and kept a discerning eye open. I had never known the supernatural origins of Nessie but am convinced that this theory is more than likely. I would not be at all surprised. I enjoyed all the lore and mystery surrounding the legend. Very interesting. Loved preparing for a trip to Scotland with something a little more unique than clan history.
very good book. Its about various paranormal events in and around Loch Ness. It could be called the Nessie propehcy. There ufo, men in black, odd syncronichity, ghosts, an exorcist and yes the famous cryptids. When you read this book, you will likely find that the Nessies are shape shifters instead of flesh and blood. Redfern mentions that the cryptid always find a way to elude photograph.
Dive into the Dark and Turbulent Domain of Nessie, the World’s Most Supernatural Monster
Deep in the black waters of Loch Ness lurks a long-necked, hump-backed monster that for centuries has fascinated those lucky—or unlucky—enough to see it. From the earliest sightings in 565 AD to the Nessie craze of the twentieth century, this creature has been steeped in the world of supernatural strangeness.
Join Nick Redfern on an exciting journey into the paranormal origins of Nessie, exploring ideas that go far beyond the ordinary. This comprehensive guide offers lore, unique theories, hot spots, and photographs. Experience firsthand encounters, discover how Nessie is connected to the occult, and meet other mysterious monsters that live in Loch Ness. Nessie presents a fresh approach to the mystery, one that will take you down new and sometimes frightening paths as you hunt for the truth.
What did I think of it 4 stars I actually love it even though I give it a four star rating, it's definitely on my book wish list, if your like me and love to read books that deal with cryptozoology,then you might like this one, it talks about Nessie but also talks about the other water type mysterious monsters there are or could be in Loch Ness. Plus if you love to read anything about Scottland ,then you need to read this because Nessie is part of their history .love also how you get the unique theories, hot spots and photos ( especially the photos because they bring the story to life more then anything). With that said I would love to say thinks to Netgalley who give me a chance at read what turned out to be a great book in a change for my honest opinion which this is 100% .
After nearly a year of this on my Currently Reading shelf.... I'm doing away with it and marking it as DNF. It was very dry non-fiction. A topic as interesting as the Loch Ness Monster should be presented in a more enticing manner than this was. :(