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Good Ghost Books

titch

titch

Justified & Ancient
Joined
Sep 30, 2009
Messages
3,508
Apart from Hilary Evans seeing ghosts,all my ghost books are of the a to z of ghosts,no real research just 3 rd hand accounts,copy what another writer has already made up without checking facts kind of book,any suggestions of a really good,interesting,well researched book on ghosts?
 
Harry Ludlam's books are good, if a bit old. Lots of first-hand spookiness.

Have you tried you local library? You'll find loads of ghost books in the Philosophy section. That's where I've found lots of good reads. :D

Cassandra Eason writes nice, personally-researched accounts of ghosts.
 
For something thoroughly researched Andrew Mackenzie's Hauntings and Apparitions is worth a good going over. It's based on cases studied by the Society for Psychical Research, with the addition of previously unpublished material and the author's own research.

I'd also recommend (yet again), True Ghost Stories of Our Own Time by Vivienne Rae Ellis, which, although it contains no real research as such, is a bloody good read, being the result of a search for contemporary supernatural experiences. Some of the stories are fairly run of the mill, some really quite frightening and many take place in a modern context well outside the old recycle bin. Generally speaking the experiences seem genuine, although I have to admit that any story which begins 'I've always been a bit psychic' (and there are a few) turns me right off. It's the 'nothing like this has ever happened to me before' ones that always ring true for me.
 
Very few ghost books are completely engaging, they're mostly a smattering of compelling anecdotes in a familiar pile of fifth hand tales. The problem is they are usually narrated to build up tension, instead of detailing the facts.
Not quite on topic but years ago, the 60s in fact when I was a young kid, my elder sister was a bookbinder and she brought home from work a record of the city council's reports of hauntings to which one of their services had to respond. I was told I was too young to look at it (I was probably about 8 or 9) and she could get into a lot of trouble if anyone knew she'd brought it home.
I recall the adults whispering in the next room as they looked at it, with plenty of 'would you believe it' and 'that would frighten me to death' and other stuff designed to pique an enquiring mind. I waited until they'd gone into the kitchen and guessed where she'd hidden it. It was a bound book of B&W photos, clippings and notes but I only got a few moments with it before someone came in. They probably guessed what I'd been doing because it wasn't in the same place and was taken back to work the next day.

It's so long ago that's all I can remember of events but I shall ask my sister if she remembers it when i next see her.
 
Colpepper: Sounds like that would be a fortean classic if someone could find it and print it! Makes one wonder how many things have been reported to the cops/authorities/military, only to have it all fall in the Memory Hole.

I like old classics like Phantasms of the Living (I've seen several copies for sale in used book stores over the years) and Walter Franklin Prince's Noted Witnesses for Psychic Occurrences, compendiums that are at least in the original witnesses' own words.

For something newer, last Halloween the Barnes & Noble Bookstores featured A Ghostly Cry edited by Stephen Jones, a collection of first-hand accounts given by SF/horror/fantasy writers from R. Chetwynd-Hayes and Robert Bloch to Charles de Lint and Neil Gaiman.

I often wondered what the best basic ghost book would be; I suppose D. Scott Rogo's An Experience of Phantoms comes close. At least references to other cases have proper quotes and endnotes.

I don't know if it's the same book by Andrew MacKenzie with a different title, but MacKenzie's The Unexplained came out in America as a paperback with sleazy tabloid-esque art on the cover, which disguised a very deep, scholarly book. I can't believe I gave it away years ago!!
 
amarok2005 said:
I don't know if it's the same book by Andrew MacKenzie with a different title, but MacKenzie's The Unexplained came out in America as a paperback with sleazy tabloid-esque art on the cover, which disguised a very deep, scholarly book. I can't believe I gave it away years ago!!
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Not sure if they are the same book but from the reviews I can find online they sound very similar.

Hauntings and Apparitions has a similarly shite cover illustration: three slightly transparent ladies with pillow cases over their heads, by the look of it - no wonder then that they're in the process of walking into a door.
 
colpepper1's book sounds exactly what i am looking for.aawww well nevermind lol,thank you for the suggestions.
 
titch said:
colpepper1's book sounds exactly what i am looking for.aawww well nevermind lol,thank you for the suggestions.
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I think about it occasionally and it's bizarre I've never asked my sister about it. No doubt it would turn out to be photographs of people who wanted to get a different council house holding old pennies. Having said that I remember one property, now demolished, was only three streets away!

A book I bought on the back of an excellent FT review was 'A Case for Ghosts' by J. Allan Danelek. TBH I found it pretty tedious fayre.
 
Even though really old, sites like Project Gutenberg can give some really good literature on ghosts as free downloads as the copyright has expired.

A site I use to get some really good books, including 'Phantasms Of The Living' is:

http://www.archive.org/index.php
 
"ghost to ghost" is really good, its a collection of ghost stories in canada.
 
titch said:
Do you mean "real" ghost story's,or the stephen king variety?
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if youre talking to me, it's a collection of supposdly real ghost stories throughout time.
 
Thank you real ghost story's is what i am after,as for peter underwood,i think his books are a useful "entry level" into ghosts,but now its the sort of book i want to move on from.
 
The single best "ghost-book" I have ever read is LIFE'S LITTLE DAY by Mrs. A. M. Wilomina Stirling (London and New York, 1925). I've reduced two copies of the book to the rubber band stage.

This is one of those big, boisterous, joyous British autobiographies, written by a extreme upper-class commoner who spent her life not only collecting late 19th and early 20th century ghost accounts, but in many cases interviewing the original witnesses, recording details I've never seen elsewhere.

For just one example, out of many dozens, there's a ton of solid information on the "secret chamber" at Glamis written by a woman who was not only a close friend of the Bowes-Lyons but a regular and welcome guest at Glamis Castle.

She was also the sister-in-law of William Morgan, the artist.
 
I obtained a book, of which I can't remember the author or name, but I will find out, as I lent it to a friend. It's written by a ghost hunter, and is from a highly investigative, and often sceptical side. Lots of churches and homes. The cover is in black and white, with a frame on the front. It's like an observation/diary, and very thorough. I think it was printed in the early 1980s. I'll update you on this, but it's the only ghost book I've found interesting, as the other ones, as mentioned on here, can be simple, third or fourth hand anecdotes, with, "I've always been a bit psychic..." etc. This one isn't, and I don't even think the author believes in ghosts at all, but is intrigued with the whole psychology of it.
 
coaly said:
....I don't even think the author believes in ghosts at all....
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I dunno. I think I prefer my ghost-scholars to be at the very least open to the idea of the real existence of spirits.

I've long believed that the ideal Fortean ghost-hunter would be one who is a Believer in the main who yet remains a Skeptic (in the true sense of that word) in all individual cases.
 
Apparitions and Haunted Houses by Sir Ernest Bennett, a 1930s book of answers to a request by the SPR after a radio broadcast. Many of the stories are incredibly evocative and poignant and it is full of forgotten social history.
 
I have a Fontana paperback copy of, Peter Underwood's, 'Gazetteer of Scottish Ghosts'. Short accounts, of sometimes dubious provenance, of ghost sightings, accounts and folk-tales, catalogued by geographical location. Its virtue is its concise simplicity. Just enough details to have you wondering and handy if you're visiting some place, mentioned in the book.
 
I'd recommend Will Storr vs. The supernatural, which I recently re-read.

It's basically a personal investigation into the reality of ghosts in which the author interviews mediums, exorcists, investigators, philosophers and psychiatrists, Maurice Grosse - and even Janet herself (the Enfield poltergeist Janet, that is) - joins a few vigils, and even dabbles in quantum physics.

The book starts from a fairly sceptical perspective, but doesn't stay there for long - actually, a large part of what's so entertaining, and what makes the book so humane, is watching Storr wobble from scepticism to belief and back again as the evidence piles up on either side of the argument, and depending on how shit-scared he has been by his latest experience. Storr makes a great Everyman: a mix of open-mindedness, scepticism, belief and inquisitiveness, all shifting around in response to new experiences, opinions and information - and how dark it is outside

On the sceptical side - I'm no lover of Most Haunted, but, even if I was, there is in the book one simple piece of evidence which Storr stumbles on while at a recording of the programme which puts the final nail in the coffin of it's credibility (at least as far as I'm concerned). And Storr meets his fair share of charlatans, the misguided, and the oh so utterly desperate to be special - although, to his credit, he's pretty gentle in his treatment of them and tends to leave the obvious conclusions to the reader rather than make their mind up for them.

I've seen the book described as 'lightweight', which I think is a little unfair - or, at least, gives the wrong impression. Okay, it's not an in-depth work of scientific research - Storr is a journalist, and the writing has a light and easy to read touch but, at the same time, it manages to cover some pretty complex ideas.

Possibly the most disturbing point in the whole book is towards the very end when an obviously disturbed, but hardly 'possessed', child is 'exorcised' by those who appear to be desperate to believe that his problems are due to satanic intervention. Storr, to his credit, tells those concerned that what he has witnessed is child abuse. However, there's a bit of a twist - one which would sit well in the best of movies.

I'm not going to spoil it.
 
I recently read the book and found it very funny and interesting ,and the exorcism was really disturbing.But not for any unearthly reason. :(
I to would recommend the book to anyone.
 
I recently acquired Peter Underwood's Ghosts And How To See Them.

Lots of snaps of allegedly haunted houses, some long-debunked 'ghost' photos and plenty of rehashed travellers' tales, along with accounts of the author's own encounters with the unknown. :shock:

Shaping up nicely as cross-trainer reading. :yeay:
 
I like this thread. I'm tracking down quite a few books as a result.
 
Books shops are in for a windfall when i win the lottery! :D
 
titch said:
I recently read the book and found it very funny and interesting ,and the exorcism was really disturbing.But not for any unearthly reason...
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Ah, yes - but there is that twist I mentioned. :twisted:
 
I will have to go up the dreaded attic and fetch it down to read it again,i cant remember the twist :roll:
 
OldTimeRadio said:
coaly said:
....I don't even think the author believes in ghosts at all....
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I dunno. I think I prefer my ghost-scholars to be at the very least open to the idea of the real existence of spirits. I've long believed that the ideal Fortean ghost-hunter would be one who is a Believer in the main who yet remains a Skeptic (in the true sense of that word) in all individual cases.
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I quite agree. In my experience, any advancement in understanding is achieved by a balanced, objectve approach. A believer with a sceptical approach or a sceptic with a truly open mind that is willing to be taken where the evidence or testimony leads is the only researcher who is going to get anywhere meaningful. Non-critical armchair believers and sceptics alike (i.e. in both cases, those who have effortlessly made up their minds) get precisely nowhere. Ironically, both parties are often the most vociferous in their views - defensive, I shouldn't wonder.
 
After a short delay i have started taken up the suggestions, i have just received hauntings and apparitions by andrew mackenzie, it was £500 new or 1p second hand, guess what one i bought. And the cover does have 3 women with pillow cases on their head walking into a door!
 
titchagain said:
And the cover does have 3 women with pillow cases on their head walking into a door!
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What's not to love :lol:
 
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