Customer Reviews

The Physics of Dark Shadows: Time Travel, ESP, and the Laboratory

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Frank Borzellieri, writing about difficult and possibly impossible things, has done the nearly impossible: given us a short, savvy, sage, and delightful book about the physics of Dark Shadows. How could I resist this book, combining two of my favorite things - television and time travel. But this little primer does more - it addresses such complex issues as time travel and ESP with both intelligence and humor. Where else can you find a little discussion about Einstein, Godel, and Hawking, with a limerick from J. Richard Gott's book, "There was a young lady called Bright, who could travel faster than light; she set off one day, in a relative way, and returned home the previous night"... Hey, if you want to try a time travel novel, take a look my The Plot to Save Socrates ... if you want to try learning a bit about time travel, take a look at Frank Borzellieri's book...

Time travel was an essential part of the Dark Shadows storylines. As a child, watching it, I always considered it to be just so much fantasy. However, Frank Borzillieri, in this wonderful book, describes just how these journeys through time are actually possible scientifically. However, lest the potential reader think this is some dry, scientific tome, it is anything but. The author manages to explain the physics of time travel in a very understandable, entertaining way.

I highly recommend the book to anyone who has pondered the exciting idea of traveling through time. The reader need not be a Dark Shadows fan to appreciate it. All one needs is an open, curious mind.

This is the fascinating little book that explains how it all works. As a fan you may have watched it all on Dark Shadows....time travel, parallel time. Well Borzellieri does an expert job explaining how it all works, on the show and how it might/does work scientifically in real life, if possible.

It is a fun book that can used for fun intellectual discussion whether at parties or just hanging out.

If you are a Dark Shadows fan you MUST add it to your collection. If you are a physics expert or fan you would probably enjoy this one.

I heard the author of this book on George Noory's radio show "Coast to Coast AM" for a full two hours. Frank Borzellieri knows his physics and he certainly knows Dark Shadows. It was that radio interview that inspired me to buy this book. I was not disappointed. I've read it more than once and occasionally go back to certain sections.

Borzellieri's explanation of how time travel is possible is my favorite section, but the part about telepathy is also great. I had no idea that such serious scientific studies have been done on all these topics.

If you remember Barnabas Collins and Dark Shadows, this book will bring back great memories. The author's skill in weaving together science and the plots of Dark Shadows make this a book you'll want to read and enjoy.

I became a fan of the gothic show Dark Shadows during its syndication run on the Scifi cable network. I love the great storylines and supernatural elements. That brings me to this great book. Never one for physics, I still was able to appreciate the author Frank Borzellieri's very sensible and understandable descriptions of how Einstein's theories allow for time travel. The faster you travel, the more time slows down for you. So as the book points out, space travelers are also time travelers because they are moving at such great speeds that their internal clocks slow down, thereby moving them into the future.
My favorite part of the book is when the author cites instances in Dark Shadows that he relates to the science. For example, time travel results in what is called "temporal paradoxes" - contradictions. If you travel back in time and kill your grandfather before he had your father, then you couldn't have been born. Then you couldn't travel back in time to kill your grandfather. How might this paradox be cured? "Parallel time"! which was a great storyline in Dark Shadows.
There's so much to enjoy in this book - including the science of telepathy and remote viewing, and precognition and seances. This is a real delight for all Dark Shadows fans and the scientific descriptions are fascinating, too.

I heard the author Frank Borzellieri on the Coast to Coast AM radio show two years ago and the host George Noory called "The Physics of Dark Shadows" a "great book." I bought it at that time and I agree that it is truly a great book, primarily because it is so unique. For ten dollars you cannot possibly go wrong. I also saw the author speak at the Dark Shadows convention and he gave a fascinating presentation on the physics of time travel. I don't want to repeat the glowing comments of other reviewers, but what I will add is what makes the book so special: It explains the science of time travel in a way that the average person can really understand and grasp. The author is also an authority on Dark Shadows, and he weaves Dark Shadows storylines into his scientific explanations. If you are interested in time travel or Dark Shadows, your library is not complete until you get this book.

It is a stretch to call something that is 67 pages long without the Acknowledgments, Foreword, Preface, Introduction, Bibliography, Index, About the Author, and two chapter title pages, a book. One online site said that a nonfiction book should be about 200 pages, another, Spawn, (Small Publishers, Artists and Writers Network) said "Most nonfiction books are between 170 and 300 pages. If your book will have fewer or more pages than these, be sure that there is a good reason for it. "

This work is along the lines of an article that devotes a few paragraphs to each of various topics, none with enough material or depth to give more than what amounts to a definition of the topics, rather than a real explanation or elaboration of the topic. One of the longest sections, five pages, is devoted to the Amityville Horror tale, maybe because the author had already written a chapter about it for a book he previously wrote. To quote the author, and the quotation marks are his own within this quote, "When `researching' for this book, therefore, I simply went back over material I already knew."

One thing the author seems to think he knew about is remote viewing, which he touches on in his section titled Clairvoyance. To quote Mr. Borzellieri: "Interesting ancillary observations of all these experiments concluded (sadly, I suppose) that very few people are good at remote viewing or clairvoyance, but those who are, are truly gifted."

However, Chapter 4 in the book Mind Reach, by Russell Targ and Harold E. Puthoff, two of the main remote viewing researchers at the Stanford Research Institute, is titled "Looking for Gifted Subjects; It Turns Out They are All Gifted!" On page 104 of that chapter the authors say:

"It will help to keep in mind that so far we have not found a single person who could not do remote viewing to satisfaction. Of course, there are differences in each person's ability - as there are in the ability to sing or play the piano; some subjects are more consistently reliable, others get better faster. The indications are that this is a widespread human talent, and chances are that you will be amazed at your own psychic ability."

In all, this is a not badly written booklet that is not entirely without merit, as it did give some things to think about, but that will in no way satisfy either Dark Shadows fans, or someone with a sincere interest in physics. There are mentions of particular occurrences in Dark Shadows, but not enough of these references. Someone with a real sincere interest in this subject, and not just, I presume, a monetary one, could have done a much better job.