Monsters: An Investigator's Guide to Magical Beings by John Michael Greer is classified as a book for Body, Mind, Spirit/Paranormal Phenomena/Folklore. It was published in 2002. As I started reading this book, I found the tone of the author to be almost arrogant. The author admits at the outset that he doesn't know everything about the various monsters of folklore; he does say that he knows more about the ones associated with the Pacific Northwest.
What I found to be arrogant about the author is that he thinks that just because science hasn't found explanations about unexplained phenomenon yet, then the cause must be magical or paranormal. He jumps to these conclusions without really giving any substantial explanation as to why this must be so. This shows a distinct lack of openmindedness for the scientific. Greer is a self described druid and a student of geomancy and sacred geometry.
The book itself is broken down into four parts: introduction, guide to monsters, monster investigation, and magical self-defense. The first part Greer spends time trying to convince the reader that the paranormal is real and dangerous. He dismisses science as a reasoning method to investigating paranormal phenomenon. The logic of Scientific Revolution , according to him, is based on rhetoric and not on experimentation. As I continued to read the book, I found Greer to not be very logical in his contention of the existence of monsters.
The second part discusses various types of mythical and magical creatures. Therein, Greer discusses vampires, ghosts, werewolves, faery, mermaids, dragons, spirits, angels and demons. This section gives some interesting information without talking down too much to the reader. There are several instances where the author refers to reader to read more on certain aspects of each entry in the fourth section. Greer dismisses the more modern views of vampires as animated blood-sucking corpses. He prefers the etheric vampire as the basis for what is a real vampire. When talking about creatures of faery the author dismisses J.R.R. Tolkien's creatures of Middle Earth as pure imagination, and yet there are so many similarities between what Greer describes as various creatures of faery and the elves, dwarves, and orcs of Tolkien's stories. Halfings (hobbits), I will agree, are a product of Tolkien's imagination. Greer also tries to dismiss UFO sightings as works of faery.
Although Greer gives an extensive annotated bibliography there are no direct quotes drawn from these works. Greer talks about what is in these books in broad generalities. This leads me to believe that Greer has cherry-picked information to fit his own personal belief system while dismissing other data that might not fit with his personal views. While it is somewhat interesting to anyone interested in mythical beings, the book leaves much to be desired and feels like it is not very well researched.
What I found to be arrogant about the author is that he thinks that just because science hasn't found explanations about unexplained phenomenon yet, then the cause must be magical or paranormal. He jumps to these conclusions without really giving any substantial explanation as to why this must be so. This shows a distinct lack of openmindedness for the scientific. Greer is a self described druid and a student of geomancy and sacred geometry.
The book itself is broken down into four parts: introduction, guide to monsters, monster investigation, and magical self-defense. The first part Greer spends time trying to convince the reader that the paranormal is real and dangerous. He dismisses science as a reasoning method to investigating paranormal phenomenon. The logic of Scientific Revolution , according to him, is based on rhetoric and not on experimentation. As I continued to read the book, I found Greer to not be very logical in his contention of the existence of monsters.
The second part discusses various types of mythical and magical creatures. Therein, Greer discusses vampires, ghosts, werewolves, faery, mermaids, dragons, spirits, angels and demons. This section gives some interesting information without talking down too much to the reader. There are several instances where the author refers to reader to read more on certain aspects of each entry in the fourth section. Greer dismisses the more modern views of vampires as animated blood-sucking corpses. He prefers the etheric vampire as the basis for what is a real vampire. When talking about creatures of faery the author dismisses J.R.R. Tolkien's creatures of Middle Earth as pure imagination, and yet there are so many similarities between what Greer describes as various creatures of faery and the elves, dwarves, and orcs of Tolkien's stories. Halfings (hobbits), I will agree, are a product of Tolkien's imagination. Greer also tries to dismiss UFO sightings as works of faery.
Although Greer gives an extensive annotated bibliography there are no direct quotes drawn from these works. Greer talks about what is in these books in broad generalities. This leads me to believe that Greer has cherry-picked information to fit his own personal belief system while dismissing other data that might not fit with his personal views. While it is somewhat interesting to anyone interested in mythical beings, the book leaves much to be desired and feels like it is not very well researched.
