Skunk Apes

The New Yorker: “The Cryptozoologist” (A Critique)

The magazine The New Yorker will publish a contribution to fiction entitled “The Cryptozoologist” by Tony Earley, on the 9th of January 2006, but it is online now. Here’s my early literary critique of this effort at capturing cryptozoology in The New Yorker: We are introduced to the concept of Skunk Apes, cryptozoologists, and organized cryptozoology in one specific paragraph about midway through this fictional piece: About her Bigfoot sighting, Rose learned that such creatures were routinely spotted in all of the Southeastern states—although the scientific authorities of course denied their existence—and the animals were commonly referred to as skunk [...]