Orion Magazine: Winter 2025/2026 Cryptids: On the Trail of Bigfoot and Other Improbable Beasts

Our Winter 2025/2026 issue chases the elusive cryptid—creatures that, despite mysterious sightings, dedicated societies, and extensive mythologizing, have not been scientifically proven to exist. Across the issue, writers grapple with questions of belief: Why do we want to believe in the things that we do? What might our enthusiastic focus on creatures like Bigfoot be preventing us from seeing, and protecting, in the real world? What do the stories we tell about the natural world really reveal about ourselves? Ranging from the playful to the impassioned, the fantastical to the deadly serious, Cryptids: On the Trail of Bigfoot and Other Improbable Beasts offers a tour through a menagerie both real and imagined.