JAPANESE LAKE MONSTER? - I give you this for what it's worth..

I would like to stress that I have not read this book, and have no more idea than any of you what is going to happen next...

A sharp jolt of fear, the like of which I hadn’t felt since I was standing on stage in front of the entire school about to give my introductory speech, speared me. There was definitely something there. And it was big. A big, shadowy shape, bigger than my boat. Panicked, I strained to identify it, but the ghostly form sunk deeper and within a few seconds, it had descended out of sight.

Adrenalin coursed through my system. As someone with a strong interest in the natural world, all my accumulated knowledge told me that there were no creatures of that size living in lakes high in the Japanese mountains. So what the hell was it then? I had definitely seen something. Something larger than any creature that had any right to be in this lake.

My brain scrambled for a reasonable explanation. It couldn’t find one. Then I remembered Keiko’s stories; the haunted lake. Was it some sort of water demon? After all, ‘Kuzuryu’ translates as ‘Nine-Headed Dragon’. No, of course it wasn’t a nine-headed dragon. Or even a one-headed dragon. But then what could it possibly be? A giant freshwater eel? A massively mutated sturgeon? A cousin of the Loch Ness Monster perhaps?

Read on...