Bigfoot: I Not Dead

I grew up in a different part of the world. My childhood reading consisted of Malaysian fables and Chinese legends, with just a smattering of European folklore and Indian myths. I most certainly did not know of Bigfoot until I came to Canada. Popular in the Pacific Northwest regions of North America, I first heard of this bipedal simian-humanoid on a radio show. I would later learn that, despite the dubious nature of this creature’s existence, many people claimed to have had first-hand sightings of the great ape. Bigfoot even has a place in one of our 2010 Olympics mascot line-up as a “young sasquatch who comes from the mysterious forests of Canada”- Quatchi.

Anyway, this is why I particularly liked the idea of a Bigfoot book. Meet Graham Roumieu - a Canadian illustrator who has written a few Bigfoot-themed books. Here is his latest, titled “Bigfoot: I Not Dead”:

On why he chose Bigfoot as a subject, Roumieu has this to say: “Because he is familiar to pretty much everyone – from those who have given him maybe a moment’s thought, to those who obsess over him and collect figurines, to those who might claim to have been impregnated by him - he has touched us all, yet remains a complete mystery. A mystery, at least in part due to having been passed over as a primary character until I brought him in out of the rain, plied him with booze and then put a mic and some pens and paper in front of him.”

“Bigfoot is a simple creature dealing with complicated life issues that are common to most of us (bad relationships, money woes, addictions to eating from garbage cans). By virtue of his simplicity he is able to distill down and address in elegantly crude ways (violence).” (Lit Mob)