Pepie: The Lake Monster of the Mississippi River Reviewed

Mention lake monsters and everyone immediately thinks of the Loch Ness Monster, or Nessie, depending on how familiar they are with the creature. However, lake monster stories and folklore can be found on almost every country on the planet, and the U.S. is no different. Here, in our own backyard, a strange creatures is rumored to inhabit the murky depths of Lake Pepin, the widest naturally occurring part of the Mississippi River. The creature’s history is a long one, and Chad Lewis and Noah Voss’s Pepie: The Lake Monster of the Mississippi River, is a great tome that explores the creature’s history and grants readers a look at the way cryptozoological field research is performed.

I’m usually wary of co-authored books because writers seldom share the same vision, but Lewis and Voss pulled it off easily, partly because, instead of trying to tackle the same elements, they split chapters and each author did his thing. The result is a collaboration that possesses two distinctive voices but still remains a whole. Lewis took care of the historical chapters, and the archival research is one of the highlights of the book. Going back as far as 1500 AD, Lewis looks not only into the long history of Pepie sightings but also into the history of the region and its inhabitants. In between these research-heavy chapters, Voss offers entertaining glimpses into the way the authors have gone looking for the unknown creature in Lake Pepin. These chapters are both enlightening and funny, and while the reader can more or less guess that none of the expeditions have yielded incontrovertible evidence of Pepie’s existence, Voss writes with a contagious energy that makes the reader feel like he or she was along for the ride.

From sightings and interviews to newspaper clippings and a plethora of photos, Pepie: The Lake Monster of the Mississippi River is a very complete book. Among the best things in the tome is the chapter on theories, which takes the time to explain and subsequently explore each possible theory. Again, the authors don’t offer a definitive answer, but that, it seems, was never the intent of the book. Strangely enough, what could be considered the best point in favor of Pepie’s existence comes toward the end of the book and has more to do with possibility than evidence:

“The National Science Foundation has a project focusing, in part, on flora and fauna population estimates. Their “Tree of Life” project estimates that of the 1.7 million identified and known species on the planet Earth, there may be as many as 100 million total. Add to that the sobering statistic from the United Nations Environment Programme’s estimate that 73,000 species become extinct annually. One might additionally consider the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) estimate that 95% of the world’s oceans remain unexplored and unseen by human eyes. Now, all of these big numbers and interesting percentages don’t prove any specifically, but I do feel that it begins to show the situation in an objective scientific light. It reveals a huge possibility, if not probability, in a quantitative perspective that there are species of large size that remain yet to be identified.”

My only problem with the book was the lack of professional editing, especially considering the fact that the book shows a professional layout and makes it clear that each writer involved put in the hours of work required by a nonfiction book. Luckily, this is outweighed by everything else Lewis and Voss have to offer, and that, besides being very engaging, will surely affect the way you look at the Mississippi forever.

About Craig Woolheater
Co-founder of Cryptomundo in 2005. I have appeared in or contributed to the following TV programs, documentaries and films: OLN's Mysterious Encounters: "Caddo Critter", Southern Fried Bigfoot, Travel Channel's Weird Travels: "Bigfoot", History Channel's MonsterQuest: "Swamp Stalker", The Wild Man of the Navidad, Destination America's Monsters and Mysteries in America: Texas Terror - Lake Worth Monster, Animal Planet's Finding Bigfoot: Return to Boggy Creek and Beast of the Bayou.

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