Watkins Press continues to add to its selections about folklore. Many of these publications are written more for popular than scholarly audiences, often packaged in highly compelling formats. Mike Bass published The Folklore Oracle with Watkins and now adds Frightful Folklore of North America. Bass is a storyteller, printmaker, and bookstore co-owner. He focuses heavily on folklore in his storytelling and artwork, and his new book is an anthology of legends and beliefs connected with cryptids and supernatural figures. Much of the work involves the presentation of myths, legends, and beliefs, and the entire package is compelling to read. His vibrant illustrations make the book engaging, and the project succeeds as creative non-fiction.
I will break with the protocol of saving criticism for the last section of a book review. Folklorists will critique the book's contextual dearth. There is no attribution of where he originally found the texts, and there is little contextual information. Much of the content is common knowledge and likely covered by fair use copyright guidelines, but there are obvious concerns with cultural appropriation within this publication. Furthermore, the tone of some of the entries evokes a sense of exoticism that obscures a better understanding of the content of the folklore. Readers also will not find a presentation of the methodology that Bass used in compiling the wide range of texts. These concerns need to be considered, and it would be easy to offer deeper criticisms of the book. With this preface out of the way, however, I do find that there is much to be admired in Frightful Folklore. The presentation sparks the imagination, and it will encourage readers to learn more about that content that Bass is presenting. It succeeds as a resource for opening up wider interests in myth, legend, belief, ritual, and other forms of folklore.
V. Castro's foreword offers insightful perspectives on connections between the narratives in the book and contemporary horror writing. Castro is an acclaimed horror writer, and her insights are well worth further consideration by folklorists. This theme is further developed in Bass's introduction to the book, where he characterizes the stories as "the original folk horror," and he sees them as the "lifeblood of contemporary horror" writing (11). Insights from both Castro and Bass invite readers to explore social and psychological aspects within the appeal of reading contemporary fiction and folk legends. Bass then presents a wide variety of texts and his own illustrations. Many of the legends are presented on only one or two pages, and they could easily be read aloud in classroom discussion or other public presentations. He emphasizes Indigenous stories as well as legends derived from folklore in a wide range of cultural traditions. The book's layout is key to his presentation. The artwork contributes to the perception of the texts, and the vividness of the appeal of the illustrations shows the value of connecting the texts to the artist's skill as a printmaker. The graphic design also works well in his presentation of customs, beliefs, rituals, and proverbs. They are compiled on pages that resemble printed broadsides, and the presentation will spark readers' curiosity to learn more about these collectanea. Again, there is a lack of contextual background about the specific texts that limits the book's value for researching folklore.
Despite the dearth of contextual information, Frightful Folklore does suggest wider significance in what Bass presents. He accomplishes this primarily through his use of creative writing. Many of the texts are written in the conventional third-person style of anthologists. He gives us highly readable descriptions of a range of figures who are part of folklore. Many of them are new to me, and Bass obviously consulted a wide range of sources. Within a few pages, his style of narration shifts. Readers will recognize that he has crafted fictional narratives based on the traditional stories. These are well written presentations of the emotional core of many of the narratives. Within a few more pages, Bass offers another voice. He writes of the Mahaha figure of the Nunavuts in Canada by shifting into the second-person narrative voice. The style works well, and readers will be on the alert for other uses of this literary technique. Within a few more pages, we also see a shift into the first person, plural and singular. Again, the range of styles works well as a literary device to pull the reader into elements of a larger story world.
Folklorists have compiled anthologies of folklore texts for centuries, and Bass is clearly working within this model of folklore presentation. Frightful Folklore succeeds well in this endeavor, but the limited documentation of sources and presentation of the context for what he has published limit the value of the book for folklore scholarship.
[Review Length: 791 words • Review posted on September 12, 2025]