Ghost Hunters: A Guide to Investigating the Paranormal

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This well-researched book was a wonderful addition to my past readings on the topic of spiritualism and metaphysics, particularly since it tells the story of a group of well-educated people seeking the scientific angle. The Victorian era was probably the high-point of belief in spiritualism - who doesn't picture all those fine gentleman and corseted ladies participating in seances, dabbling with Ouija boards, tilting tables and automatic writing? It's probably no coincidence that this peak in belief coincided with the rise of science as we understand it - perhaps this emerging insistence that the universe could be codified and classified and explained also gave rise to some kind of reaction against it, this belief that there were some things beyond explanation? The main haunting--that of Borley Rectory--was the most intriguing part of the book, by far, in my own opinion. The "hauntings" themselves, as well as the various people that inhabited the Rectory throughout the years were really thought provoking. After reading this book, I plan on looking up some of the "real-life" happenings of the Rectory, as well as some more about Harry Price, himself. In the United States, William James led the charge at the helm of the American Society for Psychical Research, but his investigations seemed no more fruitful than those of his British counterparts. By 1886, Blum wrote, “their annual report… had degenerated into a list of exposures of professional practitioners.” Their experiments dismantled spiritualist claims one after another, and many members began to conclude that mental illness lay at the heart of ghost sightings. It turns out that this is Neil Spring's first published novel. It turns out he's working for John Lewis (blame Goodreads; it's not stalking - I promise, Your Honour), it also turns out that this novel is one of the best ghost stories, historical novels or gothic novels that I have read in years. Bravo, that man. Wow. Seriously, damn (said in an American accent).

I read the kindle version and it was peppered with typos. Also the 'continuity' was often incorrect. The whole book is badly in need of a decent editor to get rid of these numerous amateur errors and problems, and give it a good tidy up.I didn't know before I read the book that Borley Rectory had existed and that Harry Price was a real person. Or rather I have a vague feeling that I have known and forgotten about it and it hit me when I looked up the place and the man himself on the net during the time I read the book. Strange how the mind can forget things. It is hard to enjoy a book with characters as either despicable, infuriating or boring as these. I mean all of them. Their relationships are just presented to the reader. They are unexplained. Most of the time you will not see the connection beyond what you are told about them. Usually in books when you come upon something you don't agree with, that doesn't mean it isn't well presented and explained in a book. You don't even have to accept it to understand it. Here, that is not the case. Here, I spent most of my time gritting my teeth whenever characters' feelings were in the focus. Let's just say various relationships in this book are not its greatest strength. This novel presents itself to you as an account written by one of the lead investigators during that time, and is treated very much like a diary written after the fact. The lead narrator is constantly foreboding events that have yet to happen, and adding suspense and build up throughout. All the while, keeping the reader semi-clueless about the whether or not the events that are unfolding are real. I'll be honest, I'm more interested in William James than I am in his more popular brother, Henry, because Henry wrote really snooze-worthy books and I have it in my mind that he wasn't all that nice to my BFF, Edith Wharton. I haven't read all that much of James's philosophy/psychology (but I have some of his stuff!), but the concept of him has always fascinated me, probably because Henry gets all the attention. (And then sister Alice gets no love whatsoever; my heart has always gone out to her, poor lady.)

GHOST HUNTERS didn’t convince me that spirits don’t exist. It did put a spotlight on the beliefs at the time. This fascinating and hard-to-put down volume (although I was a bit unnerved while reading it at night) follows several scientists who spent much of the 19th century (and a bit of the 20th) trying to reveal whether there was a scientific basis for many supernatural phenomena, including telepathy, telekinesis, communication with spirits, and haunted houses. In the process, they debunk many fraudulent claims (including Madame Blatavsky and the Fox sisters), but they can't quite explain away all the reports they collect.That gives me a dilemma in rating the book - sometimes I find that the hardest part of a review. if I had to judge the first part on its own, I would award it no more than two stars. For the ending, I'd give four. So overall - three stars. What? People are disappointing? They're flawed and given to delusions no matter where you look? Noooo... it can't be! *sigh*

When all is said and done, Harry Price turns out to be a character loaded with irony, and the author sets things up so that it isn't up to the last that we discover exactly what that irony entails. The "secret" Sarah carries around with her isn't so earth shattering when revealed, but even with this little bit of drama (a tad bit overdone, imho), she is also an interesting person both with and without Harry Price. There are many side characters who also come to life here -- most notably, the tenants of Borley Rectory, past and present.While the book was dry in places due to the wealth of factual information provided, I found myself unable to put it down. I came to this book knowing nothing about the subject matter but as a keen student of history and Ghosthunters did not disappoint. It started too slowly for my liking but then I found it to be drawing me more and more into the story and caring about Sarah Grey, the mysteries surrounding the haunted Borely Rectory and the strange larger than life Harry Price. This to me is a very British story. It tells of eccentricity as one man and his enterprise creating a laboratory invested in solving the paranormal mysteries of the day and of ages past. He is a showman and a self-publicist operating in a very clipped, very precise world but he is also very much part of this world. He is also a very British boffin conjuring up new devices to unmask mediums who are magicians and other paranormal fraudsters. It is also a very British story to have a situation whereby a man's qualifications and his integrity can be called into question in an area where belief is usually suspended. There are also undercurrents of secrets that must not see the light of day and repressed love that cannot be. All these events are seen from the reflection of Sarah Grey and in truth it is more her story and how events impact and how Harry impacts upon her. There was a period of time within the book which I questioned whether my idea was wrong yet that second guessing didn’t last long and my assumption was proven correct only a short while later. I think I would have been much happier had more effort been put in for the link not to be made quite so obvious, for more second guessing to be involved. I enjoyed the read despite so-called historical inaccuracies. Anachronistic as some elements may have been, it is for the author to have some poetic license and as much of the text is from Sarah Grey's manuscript written decades after some of the events in the story, it for sure could easily be explained away on this basis. I wanted to give this book 3.5 out of 5, because 3 seems miserly considering I did enjoy most of it, but I'm not quite at 4. It has some printing mistakes, missing letters, mis-spellings etc, which I mention for those of the grammatically pedantic persuasion, but this didn't overly bother me. However, I did find it somewhat long-winded and ponderous at times. The fact I've been interested in Borley since I was a child meant I ploughed through the first section where Sarah meets Harry and (eventually) becomes his secretary, but I really, really wanted them to get to the damn haunted house :). And when they got there, I was a bit disappointed that the experience wasn't more meaty.