The Mothman Prophecies

by John A. Keel

Book Overview

West Virginia, 1966. For thirteen months the town of Point Pleasant is gripped by a real-life nightmare that culminates in a strategy that makes headlines around the world. Strange occurrences and sightings, including a bizarre winged apparition that becomes known as the Mothman, trouble this ordinary American community. Mysterious lights are seen moving across the sky. Domestic animals are found slaughtered and mutilated. And journalist John Keel,...

• Format: Mass Market Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0765341972
• ISBN13: 9780765341976
• Release Date: February 2002
• Publisher: Tor Books
• Length: 288 Pages
• Weight: 0.34 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 4.2" x 6.7"

Customer Reviews

A Pseudoscience "Classic"

Here it is. Accept no substitutes. John A. Keel's _The Mothman Prophecies_ (1975) has been accepted by both UFO True Believers and cryptozoological enthusiasts as a "classic" stranger-than-science bestseller. It is frequently cited as scientific proof that we have aliens among us. Signed editions of this book sell for thousands of dollars. Alas, it is also ill-written, loaded with errors and exaggerations, and wildly paranoid. John Keel (1930-2009) was a Fortean researcher, an amateur magician, a UFO enthusiast, a globe-trotting reporter, and (like R. De Witt Miller and Brad Steiger), the author of a series of "stranger-than-science" books like _Strange Creatures from Time and Space_ (1970), _The Eighth Tower_ (1975), and _Strange Mutants_ (1985) that allege that there are massive Government Coverups enforced by sinister Men in Black to conceal a plethora of monsters and mutants and aliens among us. In a separate essay for the _UFO Review_, Keel states that the planet Venus is not real ("the astronomers made it up"). He claims that the astronomical pseudoscientific ideas of Charles Fort make more sense than the scientific discoveries made by astronomers. Much of this book actually has little to do with Mothman sightings. It is mostly concerned with promoting the claims that flying saucers are real. There does seem to be general agreement that the sightings occurred in West Virginia between Nov. 12, 1966 and Dec. 15, 1967 (the date of the Silver Bridge collapse). There were a few scattered hoaxes that occurred after this last date (Nickell, 2004); but the Mothman sightings mostly declined after this one-year period. _The Mothman Prophecies_ repeatedly claims that witnesses described the monster as having "glowing red eyes". But follow-up interviews by Benjamin Radford (2020) found that only _one_ West Virginia resident mentioned red eyeshine. It seems that Keel's sensational description was added after-the-fact. There is also, of course, Keel's assertion about the cause of the Silver Bridge collapse. Various official investigations (LeRose, 2001; Sherwood, 2002) concluded that the collapse was caused by structural damage to a portion of its architecture. Keel would have us believe that the bridge was sabotaged by alien terrorists from outer space. In the end, this book suffers from two cardinal flaws-- it is both dishonest and dull. _Resources_: LeRose, Chris. "The Collapse of the Silver Bridge". _West Virginia Historical Society Quarterly_ (Oct. 2001); Nickell, Joe. _The Mystery Chronicles: More Real-Life X-Files_. Lexington, KY: UP of Kentucky, 2004, p.93; Radford, Benjamin. "Investigating Mothman's Red Eyeshine". The _Skeptical Inquirer_ (May/June, 2020), 29-31; Sherwood, John C. "Gray Barker's Book of Bunk: Mothman, Saucers, and MIB". The _Skeptical Inquirer_ (May/June, 2002), 39-44.

Never read a book that caused me to doze off as much as the Mothman Prophesies

I was disappointed with the paranoia of a bunch of whackos given credence. At least the Men in Black movie franchise played this for what it is - a humorous tale. The Mothman Prophesies is all over the place - taking the reports of paranoid people across the country and trying to weave it together into a conspiracy to hide the truth of what (which was never made clear) by whom (also never made clear). I am assuming in 1970 with our Apollo missions making Space more real and the lying of our US government about the Cold War and the Viet Nam War being accepted by a majority of the population- there must have been a receptive audience for this book at that time. But if it were to be written for publication today in 2023, it would need to be much more focused and written as true science fiction that closed up all of the speculations into a real narrative in order to be a best seller.

A real page turner!

I have heard about this book for many years so I decided to sit down and read it and boy was I pleasantly surprised. It was so good I was so sad when it was over. Also as someone who has tons of paranormal experiences constantly I was amazed to read about phenomenon step by step that I have experienced layed out in this book. Also if you love reading about Men In Back MIB encounters this book is for you.

Interesting, but not written very well.

As a West Virginia native who has always been interested in the supernatural, I felt it was time to finally read the Mothman Prophecies. I guess I was expecting a bit more of a novel with some true accounts of locals. I unfortunately found it to be scatterbrained. I normally can devour a book I'm interested in after a day or two, I felt it took me hours to get to page 80 here, I got bored of all the standard UFO sightings and just gave up early on.

They're all different pieces of the same puzzle!

If you want to read one book about how creepy the truly weird can become, start with this one. This book is probably the most frightening, bizarre book ever written in this field, by a reporter who was actually there when the events happened.Some of the reviewers that gave this book one star probably missed the point. The reason that Mothman, the men in black, and UFO reports are all in the book is that these are all different pieces of the same puzzle; they didn't all show up there together by coincidence. The book seems to jump around from topic to topic because all of these things were happening at the same time, and they are interrelated. Some readers probably don't see that (or don't want to), probably the same ones who saw the movie first and then decided to pick up the book, not realizing that "the rest of the story" is much stranger than the movie ever hinted at.The movie, which only focused on psychic effects of the Mothman sightings, left out many important aspects of the mystery (mostly so they could add a fictional love story for Richard Gere.) A friend who hadn't read the book called the movie "incomplete", which is the best description I could give it too. But the book weaves all the bizarre elements together gradually as the events unfold, and they all need to be taken together to find some understanding of these phenomena. (Read Keel's classic "Operation Trojan Horse" for even more on solving these deep mysteries.)Sure, this book isn't "All About Mothman", but that's a weak criticism. The movie wasn't about Mothman at all! At least the book has enough scary moments for a decade of Stephen King TV miniseries. That's more than enough reason to give it 5 stars, whether or not you believe in these types of phenomena. Read it before bedtime at your own risk.

Changed my outlook on the world

I never read 5 star reviews because they usually just gush about how wonderful the book is and don't provide a balanced view. Yet here I am doing just that. But this book is perhaps the only of the many I have read on UFOs, the "paranormal" or the occult that truly deserves it. First and foremost, Keel is a great storyteller. He transcends the dry facts of the phenomena he investigates and weaves them into compelling human stories while, at the same time, challenges the readers to examine their own assumptions and biases about paranormal phenomena. I began reading about flying saucers and related phenomena because I thought they were silly and they appealed to the same part of me that appreciates Alfred Jarry or Marcel Duchamp. But by reading Mothman, I discovered that there are real human stories, real lives changed forever by these events that I found so silly. That reality is so much stranger and wonderous than I was willing to accept.

Paranormalist Dream, Read This

I was both amused and entertained! Yet there is an air of realism to this book that really gets to you. When you are finished reading this book, even being the grandest sceptic... The only thing that left me slightly short was the fact we are not informed of where these paranormals originate. But that is not important as the story is super written and not a weak spot in it. I say absolutely yes, get it.If you enjoyed this another book which states all these events(including the Roswell crash) are actually from our future in a very good book, SB 1 or God By Karl Mark Maddox.

Fascinating true account of the paranormal

I have read over 200 books on UFOs and for many reasons, this is my favorite. Keel is an honest investigator who was fortunate to be involved in the strange, spooky events he writes about. Taken along with his first book, Operation Trojan Horse, this slim volume says more about the true nature of the UFO phenomenon than almost any other book written since. I was initially doubtful of the validity of Keel's claims, as some other reviewers are. However, I had the luck of meeting a man mentioned in the book who accompanied Keel on his investigations. This person, whom I trust and sincerely believe to be honest, flatly stated that everything in the book was true, that he had been there, spoke to the witnesses, and eventually became involved in the phenomena, as did Keel. The fact is, these things happened. In fact, Keel left some of the strangest evidence out of the book. Mothman Prophecies is a fascinating true story, and I recommend it to anyone who has a real desire to know the truth about UFOs and the paranormal.

A classic of the genre; fascinating, disturbing, spooky!

John Keel's THE MOTHMAN PROPHECIES can stand simply as a "stranger than science" potboiler, but it's much more than that. Keel is recognized as one of the few "serious" researchers into the paranormal, and the power of his insights into this vexing subject shows in the fact that his ideas are quoted and seconded by no less a UFO authority than Dr. Jacques Vallee. The "high strangeness" nature of what is described in the book morphs easily into what is generally perceived as "pure kookiness" -- but the strength of the book lies in the way that line between belief and disbelief and truth and fiction is pushed further and further, with a good deal of shivers and goosebumps building up along the way. Bottom line: The book's utterly unique, and worthwhile reading.