In this second compilation of Dr. Karl Shuker's popular natural history blog, he examines a wide range of strange creatures and alleged mystery animals, from Australian monkeys and the Big Grey Man, to the fictional zoology of the Dr. Dolittle tales.

A collection of some of the most popular blog posts by Dr. Karl Shuker, on wonderfully weird animals, zoomythology, cryptozoology, and more.

The spectacular front-cover painting by American artist Michael J. Smith, depicting 17 astonishing mystery beasts and other controversial entities, was the inspiration for this latest book by leading cryptozoologist Dr. Karl Shuker. Ever since first seeing it in 2012, Shuker has wanted to prepare a book incorporating this painting's eclectic company of creatures, but the fundamental problem that he faced was how to categorize them collectively. Eventually, Shuker concluded that only one such term could satisfy all those requirements. Indeed, it was tailor-made for this purpose. The term? What else could it be? "Monster"! Derived from the Latin noun "monstrum" and the Old French "monstre," "monster" has many different definitions-a very strange, frightening, possibly evil/ugly mythical creature; something huge and/or threatening; a mutant, or abnormal animal; even something extraordinary, astonishing, incredible, unnatural, inexplicable. These definitions collectively cover all of this book's subjects-and so too, therefore, does the single word "monster" from which the definitions derive. Consequently, this book is a manifestation of monsters-a unique exhibition, a singular gathering, an exceptional congregation of some of the strangest, most mystifying, and sometimes truly terrifying creatures ever reported. Karl P.N. Shuker graduated from the University of Leeds with a Bachelor of Science (Honours) degree in pure zoology, and from the University of Birmingham with a Doctor of Philosophy degree in zoology and comparative physiology. He now works full-time as a freelance zoological consultant to the media, and as a prolific published writer.

This is the first book to be devoted to the spectacular zoological discoveries and equally amazing rediscoveries of the twentieth century - and it contains the only comprehensive collection of photographs of these species ever published. It is a fascinating and encouraging book that provides good reason for believing that our world still holds many more surprises in store.

Scientists recently found the coelanth, an archaic lobe-finned fish, lurking on the ocean floor, looking exactly like its ancestors in fossils dating back 70 million years. The question this book tries to answer is: How many more "extinct" species are out there, awaiting discovery? Colorfully illustrated accounts are given of contemporary encounters with winged beasts reminiscent of pterodactyls, with prehistoric giant vultures, and with sea creatures clearly related to plesiosaurian sea serpents. Here is the most complete account yet of the amazing discoveries which were dismissed as foolishness just a few years ago.

This delightful book is the long-awaited, greatly-expanded new edition of one of Dr Karl Shuker's much-loved early volumes, Extraordinary Animals Worldwide. It is a fascinating celebration of what used to be called romantic natural history, examining a dazzling diversity of animal anomalies, creatures of cryptozoology, and all manner of other thought-provoking zoological revelations and continuing controversies down through the ages of wildlife discovery. Handsomely supplemented by a vista of enchanting Victorian engravings to evoke the spirit of the period from which the inspiration for this book is drawn, Extraordinary Animals Revisited offers an enthralling introduction to a veritable menagerie of truly astonishing beasts: From singing dogs to serpent kings, pseudo-plesiosaurs to quasi-octopuses, hounds with two noses and birds with four wings, the Sandwell Valleygator and New Mexico's medicine wolf, cobras that crow and snake gods that dance, giant solifugids and rodent colossi, devil-birds and devil-pigs, furry woodpeckers and marsupial hummingbirds, archangel feathers and the scales of the Eden serpent, scorpion-stones and elephant-pearls, tales of the peacock's tail, parachuting palm civets, missing megapodes, blue rhinoceroses, glutinous globsters, anomalous aardvarks, a platypus from Colorado, man-sized spiders from the Congo, de Loys's lost Venezuelan ape, Margate's marine elephant, a flying hedgehog called Tizzie-Wizzie, a mellifluous mollusc called Molly, India's once (and future?) pink-headed duck, the squeaking deathshead, the vanquished bird-god of New Caledonia, and much much more - all waiting to amaze and amuse, a pageant of natural and unnatural history.