The Field Guide to North American Hauntings: Everything You Need to Know About Encountering Over 100 Ghosts, Phantoms, and Spectral Entities [Paperback]

W. Haden Blackman (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 6, 1998

From headless phantoms and screaming specters to invisible poltergeists and disembodied voices, ghosts occupy our homes, infest cemeteries and graveyards, lurk in nearby caves and forests, and even wander city streets. However, despite the wealth of sightings, aspiring ghost hunters have few resources.
        
Now, for the first time, here is a fully functioning field guide for those courageous investigators who wish to observe and interact with supernatural beings and the spirit world. Drawn from all available evidence, including recent research and sightings, modern urban legends, and Native American mythology and North American folklore, this book describes in detail over 100 haunted sites and their resident specters.
        
Brimming with useful advice and practical tips for the ghost hunter, The Field Guide to North American Hauntings provides vital information for those seeking to encounter ghosts. Whether exploring the lonely cells of Alcatraz or the desolate stretch of road known as Route 666, or searching for specters at the White House, ghost hunters will always be prepared with The Field Guide to North American Hauntings.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

W. Haden Blackman itemizes over 100 haunted sites and their resident specters, focusing on haunted houses, haunted vessels, haunted cemeteries, and haunted sites in nature--from the Hotel del Coronado in San Diego (where Kate Morgan, killed on Thanksgiving Day in 1892, now appears in a black lace dress and makes strange choking noises) to Franklin's Haunted Orchard (where a foreign-born peddler was killed and buried under an apple tree in 1759, and where apple trees have continued to this day to produce blood-stained blossoms and blood-streaked apple pulp).

Blackman intends his guide, however, to be more than just another ghoulish anthology. If you want to find and interact safely with ghosts, you need to know where to go, what to look for, and how benign the ghosts are. For each site, along with a full narrative and supernatural history, Blackman includes its address and whereabouts, the number of ghostly residents, their identities, and the type of ghostly activities that have been observed. He tells what their demeanors are (their personalities; propensities for mischief, violence, or both; and attitudes toward the living), and the likelihood of encountering the spirit or ghostly phenomenon while visiting. A chapter on ghost hunting provides worthwhile tips for anyone wishing to avoid, cope with, or encounter a spectral presence, and the appendices--with sample questionnaires for ghost witnesses, sample questionnaires for ghosts, a glossary, and listings by state and province--round out the practical nature of Blackman's guide. But even if you haven't the slightest interest in searching out ghost haunts, the book is worth it for the sensational stories alone. --Stephanie Gold

From the Inside Flap

From headless phantoms and screaming specters to invisible poltergeists and disembodied voices, ghosts occupy our homes, infest cemeteries and graveyards, lurk in nearby caves and forests, and even wander city streets. However, despite the wealth of sightings, aspiring ghost hunters have few resources.

Now, for the first time, here is a fully functioning field guide for those courageous investigators who wish to observe and interact with supernatural beings and the spirit world. Drawn from all available evidence, including recent research and sightings, modern urban legends, and Native American mythology and North American folklore, this book describes in detail over 100 haunted sites and their resident specters.

Brimming with useful advice and practical tips for the ghost hunter, The Field Guide to North American Hauntings provides vital information for those seeking to encounter ghosts. Whether exploring the lonely cells of Alcatraz or the desolate stretch of road known as Route 666, or searching for specters at the White House, ghost hunters will always be prepared with The Field Guide to North American Hauntings.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: Three Rivers Press; 1 edition (October 6, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0609800213
• ISBN-13: 978-0609800218
• Product Dimensions: 7.4 x 0.6 x 9.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,127,689 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars The Field Guide to North American Hauntings :, October 31, 2000

By 

Dennis Phillips "The Book Friar" (Bulls Gap, Tennessee USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Field Guide to North American Hauntings: Everything You Need to Know About Encountering Over 100 Ghosts, Phantoms, and Spectral Entities (Paperback)

An entertaining book but one that struck me as absurd at times. Blackman tended to rate a large number of spirits as dangerous and kept warning that headless ghosts might well take the head of a mortal to replace their own missing head. The most off the wall section of the book is a survey form which one is to use to question any ghost he might meet. I don't know about anyone else but should I meet a ghost I don't suspect I will take the time to ask it to fill out a short survey for me.

16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good Reading for an Average Ten Year Old, July 15, 2003

By 

M. Hori "Jesse Glass" (Urayasu, Chiba Japan) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Field Guide to North American Hauntings: Everything You Need to Know About Encountering Over 100 Ghosts, Phantoms, and Spectral Entities (Paperback)

Remember that episode from the old Dick Van Dyke show where the comedy team gets together to persuade Rob to do ridiculous things over the phone? They finally push Rob too far when they tell him to scream like a chicken. The jig is up, as they say when Rob finally "gets it" and says, "Hey, you guys....wait a minute!" The laugh track roars. Everyone confesses and Rob has egg on his face because he was suckered right along for most of the episode. That's the feeling one gets after reading the first ten pages of this book and encountering such classic bits as:

"As with the Hull House, you can search for ghosts at the Lalaurie site from outside: simply stand in the shadow of the building and listen intently for screams of any kind."

"Do not chase the Palatine Light or follow it out to sea, as many oceanic ghost lights have a tendency to lead the curious to their deaths."

"Any phantom missing any part of its anatomy is potentially dangerous, largely because these ghosts are extremely preoccupied with regaining whatever it is that they have lost."

If you think you have a ghost in your house, the author suggests:

"Give the ghost a room. Set aside a portion of the house specifically for use as the ghost's private quarters..."

"Set Limits. Let the ghost know what you will or will not tolerate...."

"Include the ghost during family functions... On holidays...have a little gift for the spirit..."

And don't forget to scream like a chicken! Yes, these comprise just a sampling of Blackman's avuncular dolings out for anyone dense enough to take them seriously. Moreover, if you encounter a ghost, the author suggests some things you might want to ask it, like:

" What do you enjoy most about being a ghost?"

"Have you ever attacked anyone using your ghostly powers?"

"Do you enjoy frightening people?"

"Do you know what a 'ghost' is?"

And on and on. (One question that the author forgets to add to the list is "Do ghosts go to the bathroom in the other world?" It would not be out of place.)

Now this kind of cuteness would be tolerable in a child's book, but this book bills itself as a "Field Guide"--as in an exhaustive, serious, even scientific guide to this or that biologic, botanic, or geologic manifestation. Given that those more rigorous parameters remain unfilled, what we miss most is the sudden eruption of a laugh track at the appropriate moments while reading this book. (But of course, ever-resourceful ghost hunters could always make their own.)

The stories themselves are simple rehashings of the same material that other writers have done to death. In other words, expect no new primary information on the hauntings the author discusses.

Blackman does have the courtesy to include a bibliography at the end of the book, but all of the books he lists are rehashes themselves.

So, ok. What's good about this book? The cover art by Kamil Vojnar is really impressive. (For that I've given this book 3 stars.)

What's the scariest thing about this book? Random House publishes it as a book for adults. Remember that Random House began as a publisher for William Faulkner, Gertrude Stein, James Joyce and other great writers of the twentieth century. This fact alone is enough to give anyone the creeps when thumbing through these "haunted" pages.

18 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars This book is a joke, February 20, 2002

By 

Mike Hathaway (Dallas, TX United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Field Guide to North American Hauntings: Everything You Need to Know About Encountering Over 100 Ghosts, Phantoms, and Spectral Entities (Paperback)

Not only does the author claim that the Amityville Horror is absolutely true (both George Lutz and the AH author, Jay Anston, claimed it was a hoax to raise money to save George's failing business interests), he also goes on to give false "facts" about the legend of the Bell Witch of Tennessee. I only read those two stories in this book and that was enough for me.

Do yourself a favor and look for haunted facts elsewhere.

If it were an option, I would rate this book NO stars