From School Library Journal
Grade 4-6A tantalizing trip to publicly accessible occult sites in California, Oregon, and Washington. In the introduction, a dramatically lit photograph of the famous San Jose, CA, Winchester Mystery House highlights Woods account of his own eerie experience there. He then lists some spots reportedly haunted by real ghosts and others that have turned out to be just local legends. The Hotel Del Coronado and the permanently docked Queen Mary boast sad and sometimes frightening apparitions from their colorful past. Here, as well as in missions, a theater, a marketplace, a ghost town, a lighthouse, historic homes, restaurants, Alcatraz, and even a modern toy store, various people relate spooky encounters. Nearly every site is made easily recognizable through large, atmospheric, exterior and interior photographs, sometimes populated by ghostly figures admittedly staged by the author. Simple state maps in the introduction and at each chapters beginning locate the haunted places while the index lists not only sites, but also the names and types of spirits described in the text. For each place, Wood carefully indicates the most likely times and spots where ghosts may be encountered. This is a wonderful combination of guidebook and chilling ghost stories that provides thrills to be savored many times over.Ann G. Brouse, Big Flats Branch Library, NY
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
Wood continues his otherworldly series begun with Ghosts of the Southwest (1997), this time chronicling reports of phantoms from California, Oregon, and Washington. For each location (a variety of hotels, restaurants, homes, ships, prisons, parks, and missions), he provides a history of the site, reports from those purporting to have seen the specter, and accounts of the spirit's supernatural activities. Full-color photos appear on nearly every page; many have been altered so that they seem to include apparitions. Wood makes no effort to discount the reports of his informants or offer rational explanations for these sightings, and some young readers may have difficulty separating fact from fiction., particularly in light of the eerily lit, real-looking photographs. But if you're in the mood for a chilling, can't-put-it-down read, this will hit the spot. Kay Weisman
