Mike Bass

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courtesy Mike Bass

A close-up of Mike Bass.

Mike Bass

As co-owner of Zip-Dang on Monroe Street, Mike Bass sells “the un-mass-produced unusual.” So it’s fitting that his first book — Frightful Folklore of North America: Illustrated Folk Horror from Greenland to the Panama Canal — arrives just in time for spooky season and explores 100 gruesome and scary tales that were, as Bass notes in this handsome book’s introduction, “spawned by the wilderness, harshness and tragedy of this continent.” Bass also is a printmaker, and his ink and pencil drawings add artistic depth. If you can’t make it to this month’s appearance, Bass also will be at Mystery to Me on Wednesday, Nov. 13.

media release: A Room of One's Own is excited to welcome local author Mike Bass in celebration for his brand new book Frightful Folklore of North America: Illustrated Folk Horror from Greenland to the Panama Canal.

This is an in-person event at A Room of One's Own Bookstore  

About the book:

Tapping into the resurgence of interest in horror and folklore and illustrated with 75 linocut-style artworks, this contemporary, cool and highly desirable collection of scary North American legends has standout visual appeal.

"The brilliance of Frightful Folklore of North America is how it captures the expansiveness of the land, the various cultures (Native and non-Native), the stories told over time ... This impressive collection will haunt your imagination." – V. Castro

This beautifully illustrated book offers scary legends and folklore from Canada to Mexico and from the Atlantic to the Pacific coast, including Native American tales, settlers’ stories and African-American legends, as well as ghost stories and modern tales of cryptids.

Shake in your shoes as you read about:

--Qallupilluit of the Inuit These green slimy web-handed creatures hunt along the ice floes in the water in the Arctic regions, kidnapping children that wander too close.

--La Corriveau of Quebec, a woman hanged for murder and witchcraft, runs through the night in her gibbet chasing her victims.

--Ghost Moose of Maine: Hunters pursue this spectral creature until they perish.

--Resurrection Mary of Illinois is the ghost of a woman killed in a hit-and-run accident outside a Chicago dancehall who asks drivers for a ride home.

--Goatman of Alton Bridge Texas: a goatherder murdered in the early 1900s has returned as a half-goat, half-man to exact revenge.

--La Diabless of Tobago Is a young woman who made a pact with the devil. When in human form, she entraps men with her beauty and leads them astray into dark places, where they meet an untimely end.

--The Camazotz of Mexico are large man-bats that lived in the forest and hunt humans in packs.

--And many, many more! Great for campfire storytelling or as a chill-inducing gift, this is the most readable and attractive book of spooky folklore on the market.

MIKE BASS grew up in a house with spirits and has always been fascinated by myths, folklore and the supernatural. He is a print maker, folklorist and storyteller who loves hearing a good tale as much as telling one. In his art, he combines ink and pencil drawings with printed textures to create minimally layered illustrations with rough lines and simple and opaque palettes that works well with the folkloric subjects. He owns, with his wife, the Zip-Dang shop in Madison and is the author of the Folklore Oracle.