Joe Gisondi grew up in New Jersey reading the  National Enquirer and from an early age. Before 1967, the tabloid focused on gory true crime stories, but in order to be stocked in newspaper checkout lines they changed their focus to celebrities, UFOs, and the occult. And the world was made better for it, because it inspired the paranormal bug in little Joe Gisondi.

They’ve been running these stories since the 60s, everybody…

Joe worked at different Florida newspapers for two decade, becoming an expert in sports news coverage, before settling down as a journalism professor at Eastern Illinois University in 2002. But he never lost that interest in the weird and wonderful and decided to write a book about the hunt for Bigfoot.

Bigfoot from the Patterson film, what some people consider the best evidence of the creature

You know it’s gonna be a great book when America’s eminent Cryptozoologist, Loren Coleman gave it the NUMBER TWO  recommendation for 2015’s top cryptozoology books  (right behind our friend Tea Krulos’ excellent  Monster Hunters !)

Joe’s take was not just writing about Bigfoot, but about the people who have upended their lives in hunting for the famous monster. What motivates someone to take months and years of their lives, go in the woods, and chase after a mythical (until it’s proven at least) beast? Especially when most other people just think you’re crazy.

That’s what Joe intended to find out. In the process of working on the book, he got to go on several expeditions himself and he might have had his own sasquatch encounter. We cover those expeditions, the weirdest thing he ever saw in Florida, and some of the regional differences in Bigfoot/Skunk Ape/Sasquatch lore in this interview.

You can pick up a copy of  Monster Trek: The Obsessive Search for Bigfoot   right here , like the book on Facebook , and learn more about Joe at this link. He’s got a weekly sports podcast  and you can find Joe on Twitter at  @MonsterTrekJG for Bigfoot and @joegisondi for sports media.