History Literature / InCryptid

** Novella: ''The Measure of a Monster'': now available in the back of ''That Ain't Witchcraft''. Takes place soon after Alex and Shelby have returned from Australia (and the events of ''Pocket Apocalypse''.) [[spoiler:A tangential comment by Mary in That Ain't Witchcraft probably relates to this novella. Also, Sarah has recovered sufficiently from the events of ''Midnight Blue-Light Special'' to play an especially significant role.]]

** Novel: ''Imaginary Numbers'': released February 25, 2020. Sarah Zellaby, a johrlac/"cuckoo" and adoptive cousin of the Prices, is heading home to Oregon after [[spoiler:healing from the events of ''Midnight Blue-Light Special'']]. Unfortunately, other cuckoos have sinister plans for her.

** Novel: ''Backpacking Through Bedlam'': March 2023. [[spoiler:Alice and Thomas return home.]]

** Novel: ''Backpacking Through Bedlam''

* BackToBackBadasses: Dominic and Verity in the tunnels beneath New York.

* WhamEpisode: "Halfway Through the Wood" is a novel-length story that covers not only [[spoiler:Enid's death]], but Alice finally telling Thomas she loves him, and [[spoiler:the bargain Thomas made with the Crossroads for Alice's life]].

* CosmicRetcon: In ''That Ain't Witchcraft'', [[spoiler:Antimony's defeat of the [[EldritchAbomination Crossroads]] is explained by [[spoiler:the [[GeniusLoci Anima Mundi]]]] as this, since she [[spoiler:went back in time and killed them before they ever took the Anima Mundi's place]]. Somehow, this doesn't cause any temporal paradoxes, and everything [[spoiler:the Crossroads]] did (or "didn't do") still happened and [[RippleEffectProofMemory everyone remembers it]]. It can be quite a MindScrew.

* ShootingLessonsFromYourParents: This has been the case for several generations of the Price haley family since they left the covenant. There are several references to going to the range for training and maintaining skills, even not being allowed to go there as punishment. Of the current generation; Alex is the deadliest shot, Verity is the ''best'' shot, and Annie best with throwing knives over pistols and long guns the former two use.

* InexplicableLanguageFluency: Of the GeneticMemory version, When Candice the Dragon Princess comes up against the LizardFolk wandering about the new york sewers she's able to make them halt using a guttural language. She reveals to Verity that it's a inborn language all Princesses know and something the "Servitors" are meant to respond to. She's also never used it before as Servitors can only be created from a [[spoiler:living male dragon]].
* InexplicablyIdenticalIndividuals: All Johrlacs look remarkably similar when they're not using their psychic powers to make people think that they recognize them. This is explained as a byproduct of their being psychic - since they don't recognize prey or each other by visual cues, they never saw a reason to develop visual cues to distinguish themselves from each other. A simple haircut and the right eye color and any Johrlac can stand in for another of the appropriete sex.

* MistreatmentInducedBetrayal: Played with. Adrienne, an old cryptid roller derby acquaintance [[spoiler:outs Timpani to Sam as Antimony Price]] because she feels that she was "just trying to eat" and unfairly exposed and kicked out. The truth is that said cryptid was not so innocent in her feeding and was hurting people doing so. She was kicked out because her method of feeding could have drawn unwanted attention and endangered the other cryptids who really were being circumspect and careful in theirbehaviorr. She pretty much took the shot at "warning" Sam for spite because she had to find another feeding ground with people who wouldn't recognize her for what she was and lacked the know-how to do anything about it if they did find out.

** [[OurMermaidsAreDifferent Finfolk]] are {{Metamorphosis Monster}}s that slowly transform from a humanoid body to a mermaid one, while also losing their memories of life on land and higher brain functions. Eventually, truly old finfolk become gigantic fish with no intelligence to speak of, and show no hesitation in eating their own children and grandchildren. This goes the other way as well, since according to second-stagee finfolk the third-stagee finfolk are delicious.
** Waheela are known to [[OffingTheOffspring eat their own cubs]] if hungry enough. Istas was born into a litter of five. By the end of winter, there were only three left, she still fells bad about that.

* InexplicablyIdenticalIndividuals: All Johrlacs look remarkably similar when they're not using their psychic powers to make people think that they recognize them. This is explained as a byproduct of their being psychic - since they don't recognize prey or each other by visual cues, they never saw a reason to develop visual cues to distinguish themselves from each other.

** The entire town the Healy farm borders on. Fran disdains them for that, but their tendency to ignore and rationalize helps keep the Healy family from gaining too much unwanted attention.

* MistreatmentInducedBetrayal: Played with. Adrienne, an old cryptid roller derby acquaintance [[spoiler:outs Timpani to Sam as Antimony Price]] because she feels that she was "just trying to eat" and unfairly exposed and kicked out. The truth is that said cryptid was not so innocent in her feeding and was hurting people doing so. She was kicked out because her method of feeding could have drawn unwanted attention and endangered the other cryptids who really were being circumspect and careful in their behaviour. She pretty much took the shot at "warning" Sam for spite because she had to find another feeding ground with people who wouldn't recognize her for what she was and lacked the know-how to do anything about it if they did find out.

** [[OurMermaidsAreDifferent Finfolk]] are {{Metamorphosis Monster}}s that slowly transform from a humanoid body to a mermaid one, while also losing their memories of life on land and higher brain functions. Eventually, truly old finfolk become gigantic fish with no intelligence to speak of, and show no hesitation in eating their own children and grandchildren. This goes the other way as well, since according to second stage finfolk the third stage finfolk are delicious.
** Waheela are known to [[OffingTheOffspring eat their own cubs]] if hungry enough. Istas was born into a litter of five. By the end of winter, there were only three left.

* LoveAtFirstSight: As of "The Way Home", Alice Healy and Thomas Price on meeting each other. It takes both of them a while to realize it though...

* BarFullOfAliens:

* ContinuityDrift: A few examples, the exact circumstances of grampa thomas's disappearance for example. If hell exactly exists and how to go there. Just how diverse the Aeslin religion is.

* HarsherInHindsight: In "The Lay of the Land", Mary jokes that Thomas is "doomed" and should "just accept [his] fate now". We later find out that [[spoiler:Mary brokered the DealWithTheDevil between Thomas and the Crossroads, which led to him eventually being TrappedInAnotherWorld]].

* HonoraryAunt: More like "Honorary Uncles and Aunts".

* JerkassWoobie: Jonathan Healy, while he could be rude sometimes, was overall a friendly person who loved the cryptid world and would do anything to protect it. That changed with the death of his wife Fran, murdered by unknown enemies. He blamed the cryptid world for her death, and the only reason he didn't take their daughter Alice to live somewhere far away was the risk of [[KnightTemplar the Covenant]] finding them. When Thomas moves to town, Jonathan is immediately hostile, both because he's Covenant (though all but defected like Jonathan's parents did) and because he's an OverprotectiveDad to Alice. In one of their many arguments, Thomas points out that he's only referred to Alice by name once in the conversation, the rest of the time defining her by her relationship to him ("my daughter"). He's retreated into himself in the decade since Fran's death, and built up a version of Alice in his mind that's nothing like she really is.

* LetterboxArson: ''Half-Off Ragnarok'' has Shelby's apartment is a victim of this, Alex wakes up in the middle of it and has to get them out by jumping down to the

** Antimoney has a few when she works in Lowreylan

** In the same vein, pretty much any name associated with the Covenant, if you're a Price, a Cryptid, or (in the case of the Harringtons) both.

* HonoraryAunt: More like "Honorary UNcles and Aunts".

* [[BarFullOfAliens Bar Full of Cryptids]]:

* [[HonoraryUncle Honorary Family]]: The Prices tend to collect them.

** Annie decides their odd neighbor [[spoiler:James]] is coming home as an honorary sibling.
** [[spoiler:After spending 7 years TrappedInAnotherWorld together, Thomas]] seems to see [[spoiler:Sally]] as a surrogate daughter.

* {{Metamorphosis}} / MetamorphosisMonster: Finfolk look just like humans (and can interbreed with them) until sometime in their 20s, when they start turning into merpeople. Exposure to the sea can speed up this change. This also slowly erases their memory of their life on land, and by old age they're little more than non-sapient gigantic fish, which [[MonstrousCannibalism won't hesitate to eat their own children or grandchildren]].

** Sam Taylor cultivates this facade as a form of self defense.

* LizardFolk: The reptilian Servitors the cultists create by exposing humans to dragon blood.

* BloodMagic: Jonathan covers every entryway on the house in lamb's blood to prevent the Easter Bunny gaining entry to the home.
* BondCreature: After she telepathically tames him, Greg the GiantSpider has UndyingLoyalty towards Sarah. A doctor calls him her "emotional support animal".

* DeathOfAChild: "The First Fall".
* DeathFakedForYou: In "All That Glitters", the Healys and Thomas help Betty fake her death so the Covenant won't start hunting down her and her kind for killing and robbing their agents.

* [[HonoraryUncle Honorary Family]]:

* InsultOfEndearment: Dominic to Verity most often.

** Ryan the {{tanuki}} and Istas the Waheela.

* SupernaturalRepellent: Lilu and mara are vulnerable to aconite

* AgeGapRomance: Thomas Price meets Alice Healy when she's 16 and he's 26. They don't marry until she's 22, though.

* ChameleonCamouflage: The Sleestaks, as well as several other cryptids.

** Played straight: The Sleestaks and the Lindworm in Verity's time period.
** Subverted: [[spoiler:William the Dragon]] and the Wadjet in Verity's time period, and Professor Naga in Fran & Jonathan's. Also most of the gorgons (depending on your definition of "reptile")

** {{Lamia}} are not actually snake gods who can bestow power on people who sacrifice humans to them. [[spoiler:The residual magic they carry from passing through dimensions ''can'' be harversted though, and Naga provides Alice with PowerTattoos.]]

** Waheela are known to eat their own cubs if hungry enough. Istas was born into a litter of five. By the end of winter, there were only three left.

* MonstrousCannibalism: [[OurMermaidsAreDifferent Finfolk]] are {{Metamorphosis Monster}}s that slowly transform from a humanoid body to a mermaid one, while also losing their memories of life on land and higher brain functions. Eventually, truly old finfolk become gigantic fish with no intelligence to speak of, and show no hesitation in eating their own children and grandchildren. This goes the other way as well, since according to second stage finfolk the third stage finfolk are delicious.