From Booklist:
Both a wonderfully readable reference book and a delightfully detailed ghost-story book, this is a quintessential product of the age of "infotainment." In its geographically specific sections, brief narratives spiced with specific names, dates, and places (a rare feature of books on this subject) delineate experiences with ghosts and other supernatural phenomena. Cavendish's narrative voice is one of neither fawning belief nor arch speculation but of neutral reportage. Some entries give the particulars of such well-known stories as those of Anne Boleyn and the other ghosts said to haunt the Tower of London. Other stories are less known, like that of Esther Cox, a young Canadian suddenly beset in 1878 by all manner of bizarre phenomena (in her case, the strange occurrences "were observed by the local doctor, clergymen, and other reputable witnesses"). Other chapters cover the topics indicated by such titles as "Sex and the Sacred" (for example, the sexual proclivities of some Hindu deities and their worshipers), "Of Royal Blood," and "From Salem to New Orleans." With a little supernatural something for virtually everybody, this is a prize for the public or school library. Mike Tribby
From School Library Journal:
YA-Everything about this volume is user-friendly and sure to appeal. The cover and ample illustrations are eye-catching. The information is arranged by major areas of the world: Europe; North and Central America; South America; Africa; Asia; Australasia and the Pacific. Each section has a map showing the sites of subjects mentioned in the text. The lively and readable text includes tales of doctors who successfully perform "psychic surgery" without anesthesia, curses of the Pharoahs, the vanishing hitchhiker, and phantom dogs (the basis of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's The Hound of the Baskervilles). The book is more suited to browsing than in-depth research because it covers each topic on double-page spreads-thus no subject exceeds two pages; in addition, the index is rather brief. The format and illustrations will make this volume popular, and may require a second copy to fill the demand.
Judy Sokoll, Fairfax County Public Library, VA
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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