New Books and Media

From the publisher's website: Paranormal Media – Beyond Hauntology is an investigation of paranormal media and its pervasive influence on popular culture. By examining the intersection of the supernatural and media with transnational examples this book sheds light on how paranormal phenomena from ghosts to cryptids captivate our collective imagination. Drawing on psychology, sociology, cultural studies, and history this interdisciplinary approach unravels the complexities of our fascination with the paranormal. The chapters investigate key concepts including hauntology, the uncanny, and the role of technology in shaping our understanding of paranormal media. Readers are invited to explore critical questions: How do paranormal beliefs shape cultural narratives? What role does media play in perpetuating these beliefs? And how do these phenomena reflect our deepest fears and desires? By engaging with these questions the book offers a nuanced and challenging perspective on the enduring allure of the paranormal.

Further information at the publisher's website: Palgrave Macmillan.

From the publisher's website: Originally published in 1887 by researcher Richard Hodgson and amateur magician Samuel John Davey, The Mal-Observation Report is a classic of psychical research that remains startlingly relevant to modern psychology. This 292-page volume brings together two seminal papers that revealed how performance magic methods can be used to reveal surprising limits and eccentricities of human minds.

Further information at the publisher's website: Curious Publications.

From the back cover: Those looking for a collection of amazing anecdotes about the so-called paranormal will be disappointed: this is a serious book for serious, inquisitive, intelligent readers. With a language that is both accessible and rigorous, and with the aim of combating prejudice and misinformation, the author, a medical doctor and university researcher, systematically reviews 50 peer reviewed scientific papers capturing the state of the art of research on alleged psychic phenomena such as telepathy, precognition, psychokinesis and remote viewing.

From the back cover: À la fin du XIXe siècle, Camille Flammarion, célèbre astronome et fervent spirite, mène une enquête discrète sur d’étranges manifestations survenues dans un manoir du Calvados. Cris nocturnes, déplacements inexpliqués d’objets, bris de vaisselle, apparitions… Une famille entière, des prêtres, des voisins et des serviteurs assistent, pendant plus d’un an, à une série d’événements troublants. 

Flammarion évoquera brièvement cette affaire dans Les maisons hantées en 1923, mais il ne publiera jamais l’ensemble des documents dont il disposait : lettres, témoignages, croquis, retranscriptions de séances spirites… Autant d’archives aujourd’hui exhumées et minutieusement analysées par Jonathan Giné. Cette plongée dans une enquête oubliée révèle non seulement un épisode marquant de l’histoire du paranormal en France, mais aussi la rigueur d’un scientifique ouvert à l’invisible, attentif aux faits comme aux états de conscience. Ce livre présente par ailleurs une étude complète de l’ensemble des recherches menées par Flammarion sur les apparitions, les phénomènes post-mortem et les manifestations de type spirite, ainsi que de ses prises de position dans le débat scientifique sur la survie de l’âme et la nature de la conscience. Nous avons, avec ce livre, une pièce rare au croisement de l’histoire, de la science, de la psychologie et du spiritisme.

From the back cover: From the candlelit séances of 1848 to AI-powered consciousness research, America has waged a 150-year campaign to prove the afterlife exists-armed with every tool from telegraph wires to quantum sensors. Dr. Dietrich-Kolokouris traces how ordinary citizens, ambitious inventors, and skeptical scientists turned the paranormal into a laboratory. Spirit photography, electronic voice phenomena, psychedelic studies, and neural mapping converge on a single question: does consciousness survive death?

From the publisher's website: Nightstalker. It was meant to be a refuge for him and his four-year-old daughter after a painful divorce. But unravelling the chilling secrets of the past threatens to suffocate the present. Instinctively sceptical, Matt sets out on a scientific quest to make sense of the paranormal and find peace at home. In his quest, he speaks to the Church of England’s Deliverance Ministry for advice on ‘place memories’, scientists on the theory of ‘emotional residue’, property lawyers about how they sell ‘cursed’ properties (and whether he can get his money back) and psychologists about the human brain’s ineptitude in processing the ocean of electromagnetic radiation that surrounds us – finding that the truth is much more complicated and conflicting than he’d anticipated.

Further information at the publisher's website: Elliott & Thompson.

Review by Peter A. McCue.

From the publisher's website: Canada’s paranormal roots run deep. We tell ghost stories around flickering campfires and share unexplained encounters with family and friends. Yet our polite, risk-averse nation often buries these experiences, rarely encouraging them in the places we live or in our arts and entertainment. Fear of stigma and discomfort with the unknown — especially death — keepthe supernatural in the shadows. We allow only flirtations with ghosts, ghouls, and goblins, mostly at Halloween. Eerie Whispers explores Canada’s haunted history, drawing from the diverse folklore of its immigrant communities and the traditional stories of Indigenous Peoples. It asks why Canadians, unlike Americans or the British, are reluctant to celebrate this part of our culture. Brian Baker encourages us to embrace the uncanny and find the courage needed to amplify our nation’s supernatural voice.

Further information at the publisher's website: Dundurn Press.

From the publisher's website: During a séance in 1924, Houdini—the greatest entertainer in the world—was cursed by a vengeful spirit, who said his days were numbered. Houdini laughed. He believed talking to the dead was impossible. By 1926, Houdini was dead. This is the untold story of the last performance of Harry Houdini, who—inspired by his hero Abraham Lincoln—devotes himself full-time to a personal crusade against Spiritualism, the practice of speaking to the dead. In a spellbinding journey across Jazz Age America, haunted by the aftermath of the Great War and a deadly pandemic, Houdini encounters modern-day haunted houses, warlocks, and monsters, and uncovers a shocking conspiracy that stretches all the way to the American presidency—and to the House of Houdini itself. In a compelling dual-timeline narrative alternating between Houdini’s 1926 dramatic courtroom testimony before Congress and the last otherworldly cases he takes on that lead him there, Lincoln's Ghost is a powerful examination of deception, love, politics, the afterlife, and the very nature of magic itself.

Further information at the publisher's website: St. Martin's Press.

Review by Michael Solomon.

From the publisher's website: There is an idea that shakes the core of our scientific principles: That our consciousness participates in creating our physical reality. It's an idea that runs counter to the materialist worldview we're all taught in school. But the outer edges of scientific inquiry bleed into what can only be called 'magic.' Dean Radin, Ph.D., is at the forefront of researching magic from a scientific standpoint. In The Science of Magic, he shines a light on today's scientific breakthroughs, from quantum mechanics to the mind-body connection to telepathy, that can best be explained by what we currently call magic (or psi). In short, today's magic is the science of tomorrow. He shares his own groundbreaking research on psi phenomena, and explains how you can start utilizing these findings in your own life today.

Further information at the publisher's website: Harmony.

From the publisher's website: As clanging bells pierce the Winter calm, a bustling throng of spectral visitants is making its approach. The eminent anthologist and seeker of forgotten tales, Johnny Mains, has been scouring the archives of newspapers and periodicals once more to bring you the gift of ‘new’ supernatural fiction from the Victorian and Edwardian era – the heyday of the classic ghost tale. Packed with ethereal messengers, chain-clanking ghouls, the odd cheery phantom and bundles of suspense, this collection is a welcome offering for any reader of the ghostly and Gothic.

Further information at the publisher's website: British Library Publishing.

Review by Tim Prasil.

From the publisher's website: Crumbling turrets, crenelated walls, creaking floorboards. We all know a haunted house when we see - or feel - one. That creeping sense of wrongness. An icy shiver stealing down the spine. But why do certain structures set this super-sensory alarm bell jangling, while others leave us unmoved? Can a house be purpose-built to be haunted? And does a building need a bloody legacy to set the skin tingling? Tiptoe through the haunted gallery at Hampton Court Palace, encounter the spectral residents of Chillingham Castle and lose yourself in the labyrinthine layout of Winchester Mystery House as Caitlin Blackwell Baines unravels the psyche, the history and the folkloric fabrication that make a haunted house take on a life of its own.

Further information at the publisher's website: Profile Books.

Review by Karen Stollznow.

From the back cover: In Greek mythology, the river Styx represents the boundary between the land of the living and the land of the dead. In this book, leading experts in the field of near-death studies describe what people experience on the banks of this river. The authors teamed up to present innovative and cutting-edge research on a rich variety of end-of-life experiences, near-death experiences, coma experiences, and after-death communications. In addition to bearing enormous practical significance for healthcare, these interrelated experiences indicate that consciousness is more than a byproduct of brain chemistry. On the banks of the river Styx, consciousness may emerge from the dying brain like a phoenix, spreading its wings towards new horizons.