"A fascinating and scholarly examination of the origins of the Jersey Devil, a mythical beast born in the colonial era and which lives on to this day. Written in a style suitable for general readers. Good regional trade and course adoption potential. Really interesting. Heavily researched and written in a lively narrative, The Secret History explodes the many myths surrounding the Jersey Devil. Provocative and entertaining and unlike any book written before on the subject, it finds the origins of New Jersey's favorite monster not in the realm of the occult, but in the bare-knuckled political and religious upheavals and fights of colonial America. The real story of the Jersey Devil's birth is far more interesting, complex, and important than anyone thinks. It is a product not of witchcraft, but innuendo, scandal, rumor mongering, and media hype. While a tale of early America, it could have been taken from the tabloids and internet gossip of today"--

A provocative look at the mystery surrounding the Jersey Devil, a beast born of colonial times that haunts the corners of the Pine Barrens—and the American imagination—to this day. Legend has it that in 1735, a witch named Mother Leeds gave birth to a horrifying monster—a deformed flying horse with glowing red eyes—that flew up the chimney of her New Jersey home and disappeared into the Pine Barrens. Ever since, this nightmarish beast has haunted those woods, presaging catastrophe and frightening innocent passersby—or so the story goes. In The Secret History of the Jersey Devil, Brian Regal and Frank J. Esposito examine the genesis of this popular myth, which is one of the oldest monster legends in the United States. According to Regal and Esposito, everything you think you know about the Jersey Devil is wrong. The real story of the Jersey Devil's birth is far more interesting, complex, and important than most people—believers and skeptics alike—realize. Leaving the Pine Barrens, Regal and Esposito turn instead to the varied political and cultural roots of the Devil's creation. Fascinating and lively, this book finds the origins of New Jersey's favorite monster not in witchcraft or an unnatural liaison between woman and devil but in the bare-knuckled political fights and religious upheavals of colonial America. A product of innuendo and rumor, as well as scandal and media hype, the Jersey Devil enjoys a rich history involving land grabs, astrological predictions, mermaids and dinosaur bones, sideshows, Napoleon Bonaparte's brother, a cross-dressing royal governor, and Founding Father Benjamin Franklin.

In the course of its extraordinary history, the Jersey Devil has been exorcised, shot, electrocuted, declared officially dead, and scoffed as foolishness--none of which has had any effect on it or the people who persist in seeing it!This mysterious creature is said to prowl the lonely sand trails and mist-shrouded marshes of the Pine Barrens, and emerge perioducally to rampage through the towns and cities of New Jersey and eastern Pennsylvania, leaving many communities in near-hysteria.The authors show that while a few appearances have been out-right fraud and others have likely been the result of mass hysteria, this creature has been seen by enough sane, sober, and responsible citizens to keep the possiblity of its existence alive and tantalizing.Over 50,000 in print

Emitting shrill cries and leaving its footprints in mud and snow, it has roamed the Pine Barrons of South Jersey for almost three hundred years. It is usually said to resemble a composite of several different animals, but it walks upright and us believed to be the child of a human mother.What is this mysterious creature? The Jersey Devil, of course! More than twenty years after their first book about the Jersey Devil was published, James McCloy and Ray Miller, Jr.'s, new research into this phenomenon continues to intrigue readers. Does the Jersey Devil actually exist? Or is it simply a hoax? Open Phantom of the Pines--if you dare--and decide for yourself.

"For the better part of two centuries, at least, the story of the Jersey Devil has been part of the culture of Southern New Jersey. A fire-breathing monster with the head of a horse, bat wings and the body of a kangaroo, the creature is said to be the thirteenth child of Mother Leeds, born in 1735, when the unfortunate woman put a curse on her future offspring. Informed at a tender age by his BeBop (his grandmother) that he is distantly related to the beast, Bill Sprouse goes looking for the story behind the story of his family's connection to the famous monster. The result is part memoir, part travelogue and part a raucous tour of three-hundred years of New Jersey history. The domestic life of the Jersey Devil traces the origins of the Jersey Devil legend to an obscure pamphlet war that sent the Leeds family to Leeds Point at the end of the seventeenth century, with the family patriarch, Daniel Leeds, branded Satan's Harbinger in the process. If follows the story through its connection with the residents of the Pine Barrens (the famous Pineys), who were said to live in fear of the beast, and, finally, it examines the legend in its modern iterations: X-files episodes are made about the monster, a pro hockey team is named after it, and residents of Galloway Township attempt to adopt the creature as the official town mascot. The domestic life of the Jersey Devil is a book about suburban identity, and about one suburbanite's attempt to come to terms with his family history in the most unlikely of places."--

“Old school horror.” —Jonathan Maberry THE LEGEND LIVES Everyone knows the legend of the Jersey Devil. Some believe it is an abomination of nature, a hybrid winged beast from hell that stalks the Pine Barrens of southern New Jersey searching for prey. Others believe it is a hoax, a campfire story designed to scare children. But one man knows the truth... THE DEVIL AWAKES Sixty years ago, Boompa Willet came face to face with the Devil—and lived to tell the tale. Now, the creature’s stomping grounds are alive once again with strange sightings, disappearances, and worse. After all these years, Boompa must return to the Barrens, not to prove the legend is real but to wipe it off the face of the earth... THE BEAST MUST DIE It’ll take more than just courage to defeat the Devil. It will take four generations of the Willet clan, a lifetime of survivalist training, and all the firepower they can carry. But timing is critical. A summer music festival has attracted crowds of teenagers. The woods are filled with tender young prey. But this time, the Devil is not alone. The evil has grown into an unholy horde of mutant monstrosities. And hell has come home to New Jersey... “Shea delivers a tense and intriguing work of escalating tension splattered with a clever, extensive cast of bystanders turned victims...An otherwise excellent, tightly delivered plot...Fans of cryptid creatures are likely to revel in this love letter to a legendary menace.”– Publishers Weekly Raves for The Montauk Monster “A lot of splattery fun.”—Publishers Weekly “Frightening, gripping.”—Night Owl Reviews

A startling and revelatory examination of Nabokov’s life and works—notably Pale Fire and Lolita—bringing new insight into one of the twentieth century’s most enigmatic authors Novelist Vladimir Nabokov witnessed the horrors of his century, escaping Revolutionary Russia then Germany under Hitler, and fleeing France with his Jewish wife and son just weeks before Paris fell to the Nazis. He repeatedly faced accusations of turning a blind eye to human suffering to write artful tales of depravity. But does one of the greatest writers in the English language really deserve the label of amoral aesthete bestowed on him by so many critics? Using information from newly-declassified intelligence files and recovered military history, journalist Andrea Pitzer argues that far from being a proponent of art for art’s sake, Vladimir Nabokov managed to hide disturbing history in his fiction—history that has gone unnoticed for decades. Nabokov emerges as a kind of documentary conjurer, spending the most productive decades of his career recording a saga of forgotten concentration camps and searing bigotry, from World War I to the Gulag and the Holocaust. Lolita surrenders Humbert Humbert’s secret identity, and reveals a Nabokov appalled by American anti-Semitism. The lunatic narrator of Pale Fire recalls Russian tragedies that once haunted the world. From Tsarist courts to Nazi film sets, from CIA front organizations to wartime Casablanca, the story of Nabokov’s family is the story of his century—and both are woven inextricably into his fiction.