Katie has a lot going on. She may love her cheating mom and absent dad, she may be disappointed that her friend Mary is too different now to be around, but unexpectedly Katie has made a new friend in Chester, a young man in the States illegally, fleeing a war-torn country, and working off the books for her mother.

When Katie is assaulted at a party in the forest, Chester comes to her aid in time for them both to witness the violent demise of her attacker. It was dark out, so they couldn't see what killed him, just the screaming, begging, and thrashing as he was pulled beneath the water's surface. Where do they go from here? People have been vanishing up and down the Au Sable River for months, but who would believe what they saw? Monster of Cooke Dam Pond is far more than a story about a mysterious monster stalking the outdoor-loving residents of a small Michigan town. It's a story about everyday people overcoming hardships in life such as betrayal, addiction, rape, suicide, loss of loved ones, and good versus evil within themselves. Hardships come and go, but it's how you handle them that really makes the difference.

Ever since Bradley A. Cossins was a toddler, his parents took him camping throughout many areas in Michigan. He doesn't believe there has been a year in his life that he has not stepped into a national forest for a weekend. Having worked for outdoor/sporting goods retailers for more than seven consecutive years, Cossins has come to not only cherish the outdoors as a staple of his life, but a means of regaining our childhood and to never forget where we all came from. During the time he wrote this book, he has been a student at the University of Michigan, Dearborn, focusing on environmental studies so he can one day give back to our natural world! This book was inspired by Peter Benchley's Jaws and Johnathan Rand's book series, Michigan Chillers, as well as nerdy games and interests throughout his childhood like Magic: The Gathering, "The Gitrog Monster," and his life's accumulation of camping along the Au Sable River.