Explore the Other Side

With Halloween approaching, we see signs of the supernatural everywhere. From bedsheet ghosts on front lawns to spider webs in grocery stores, everyone seems to have fun decorating with ghosts and goblins, witches and cauldrons, spiders and bats. As the days grow shorter and the darkness draws near, we are reminded of just how short our time on this earth can seem.

Welcome to the first column dedicated to the paranormal. I’m not sure if my fascination with all things paranormal, supernatural, or just plain “creepy” started with my childhood love of Halloween, or if I looked forward to Halloween because it was the one time of year when everyone’s thoughts turn toward the things that go bump in the night.

From ghosts and hauntings to psychic powers to alien abductions, the term “paranormal” covers a lot of fascinating subjects. Llewellyn has a long history of publishing books that challenge us to reexamine the known world and imagine what might be out there. In each issue of New Worlds, I’ll be pointing out some of my favorite books that might interest you if you share a curiosity about all things paranormal.

Halloween is the time when they say the veil between the worlds is thinnest, and the dead walk amongst us. I love a good ghost story, and one of my favorite ghost books is True Hauntings by Hazel M. Denning. Dr. Denning holds a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology and is also a hypnotherapist specializing in past-life regression. Together with two mediums, she explored dozens of “haunted” houses. Their collaborations revealed many stories of earthbound spirits: spirit helpers watching over loved ones, restless souls who died violent deaths, spirit contact through channeling and mediumship, and even possession by malevolent spirits.

The owner of one house that had a reputation for being “haunted” called Hazel Denning to find out the source of the disturbances. They communicated through a medium with Doris, her brother Edmund, and her lover Richard, three restless spirits who for thirty years had haunted the house where Edmund murdered Richard in a fit of rage and buried his body behind the fireplace. This unusual case was confirmed when a room in the house was remodeled and a skeleton was discovered behind the bricks!

True Hauntings also has touching stories of love that survives death, like the husband who continues to leave yellow roses for his wife and the spirit grandmother who saves her young grandson from being hit by a car.

If you like first-hand tales of the spirit world, you’ll also want to read Spirit of Love by medium Jenny Crawford. Psychically gifted since birth, Jenny has been a professional clairvoyant and medium for the past twenty-five years. The overwhelming curiosity and frequent questions she receives from people all over the world prompted her to write this book, answering the questions that many of us have about afterlife communication, the spirit world and the nature of life after death.

Discover how she receives messages from the spirit world, how spirits can prompt their loved ones to seek a medium, what happens if a person commits suicide, how long after death a spirit waits before making contact, and even how we can communicate with pets who have crossed over. She devotes an entire chapter to how to choose a reputable medium, and what to expect during your reading. This book contains many stories of the loving bonds between people, a connection that often lasts beyond death. If you are grieving or know someone who might need inspiration, this book can provide comfort and hope.

If you’d like to try communicating with spirits yourself, you might want to check out Buckland’s Book of Spirit Communications. Author Ray Buckland is a well-known authority on the supernatural. He believes that we all have the ability to communicate with those in the spirit world — it’s just a matter of discovering what methods work best for you. Presented in a workbook format, there are lessons and exercises to help you develop your psychic skills. Some of the techniques covered include clairvoyance, talking boards, automatic writing, spirit photography, table tipping, spiritual healing and electronic spirit communication using tape recorders and computers. If you’re the kind of person who wants to have firsthand knowledge and proof of life after death, this book will help you experience spirit phenomena for yourself.

Have a happy Halloween everyone, and at this time of year when the veil between the worlds is thin, remember that if you do hear something go bump in the night, it just might be a spirit stopping by to say “hi.”