NOVEMBER 2016 - AudioFile
One might expect that listening to a book about ghosts should be avoided at night. However, Colin Dickey’s history is more academic than scary, and Jon Lindstrom’s narration reflects that approach. As such, there’s no risk of sensationalizing the topic. But this more formal narration style may limit the attraction to the audio. Although the narration varies in pace and tone, and Lindstrom’s voice is comfortable and reassuring, the nonfiction tenor of the material is strong. One difficulty in this performance is that it’s often tough to differentiate the author’s words from quoted materials. Listening will work best for those who have an interest in the topic. S.C.E. © AudioFile 2016, Portland, Maine
The New York Times Book Review - Tiya Miles
…a lively assemblage and smart analysis of dozens of haunting stories, some better known than others. In each chapter, Dickey spins riveting tales and then carefully unwinds these narratives, exposing the materials and motivations of their construction…The most fascinating moments in Ghostland are Dickey's etymological musings…and his many turns down unusual paths of American history. His discussion of the links between 19th-century Spiritualism, the early feminist movement and contemporary New Age beliefs; his account of the red dwarf who is said to have haunted Detroit since the city's founding, in 1701; and his recognition that ghost stories can aid the work of historic preservation: All of these are absorbing. While many of the ghost stories he recounts can be found in academic treatments as well as lighthearted local guides, with Ghostland, Dickey achieves a capacious geographical synthesis that is both intellectually intriguing and politically instructive.
Publishers Weekly
07/04/2016
In the introduction to this illuminating study of so-called true hauntings and the American public’s enduring fascination with them, Dickey (Cranioklepty) posits that “ghost stories reveal the contours of our anxieties, the nature of our collective fears and desires, the things we can’t talk about in any other way.” Grouping haunts into four categories—houses, hangouts, institutions, and entire towns—he shows how the persistence of these ghost stories, especially when their details change with the times, say more about the living than the dead. Noting how popular accounts of the ghost of Myrtles Plantation has shifted over the years from that of an abused slave to revenants from a Native American burial ground beneath the plantation, Dickey notes that “ghost stories like this are a way for us to revel in the open wounds of the past.” Describing the ghost stories that cropped up in New Orleans in the wake of Hurricane Katrina’s devastation, he writes that ghost stories “are how cities make sense of themselves: how they narrate the tragedies of their past, weave cautionary tales for the future.” In contrast to many compendia of “true” ghost stories, Dickey embeds all of the fanciful tales he recounts in a context that speaks “to some larger facet of American consciousness.” His book is a fascinating, measured assessment of phenomena more often exploited for sensationalism. Agent: Anna Sproul-Latimer, Ross Yoon Agency. (Oct.)
From the Publisher
A Shelf Awareness Best Book of the Year
“The spectral map Dickey creates is as broad and packed as his book’s title implies . . . Ghostland amounts to a lively assemblage and smart analysis of dozens of haunting stories, some better known than others. In each chapter, Dickey spins riveting tales and then carefully unwinds these narratives, exposing the materials and motivations of their construction . . . The most fascinating moments in Ghostland are Dickey’s etymological musings and his many turns down unusual paths of American history . . . All of these are absorbing . . . With Ghostland, Dickey achieves a capacious geographical synthesis that is both intellectually intriguing and politically instructive.”—The New York Times Book Review
“For a relatively young nation, America is overrun with spirits. Mr. Dickey visits with Salem’s witches, spectral lights at a Nevada brothel and the eccentric widow who designed the sprawling, never-finished Winchester Mystery House…[to] suggest that by analyzing them we can learn a great deal about ourselves."—The Wall Street Journal
"The good news: Nothing's really haunted except by the spirits we imagine for ourselves. The bad news: We'll make anything haunted. The great news: There's Ghostland. Colin Dickey gets to the heart of the matter over and over, skirting any tourist-trap sensationalism in favor of historical context that touches on the longing and tragedy underneath ghost stories. It's a tour of America's haunted places that takes an insightful look at how ghost stories are made, how ghosts and historical visibility are so tightly intertwined, and why we keep looking for the dead."—NPR, a best book of the year pick
“Dickey neatly dissects not just the historical, but the visual and atmospheric elements that evoke a haunting . . . As he wends his way through the landmarks and their histories, Dickey thoroughly and convincingly explores the many underpinnings of ghost stories and hauntings ― as manifestations of our collective guilt, anxieties, obsessions and historical losses; and as practical schemes for money-making, land acquisition, or controlling groups of people.”—Huffington Post
“Engrossing . . . Dickey’s book is not so much about spooks and goblins, but about tales of them that we tell, and why. Its purpose isn’t to scare, but to intrigue — and on that level, it may well keep you up late.” —Seattle Times
“Capacious . . . Dickey’s omnivorous curiosity lands on everything from the fraught legacy of slavery to the role of Spiritualism in women’s suffrage to 19th-century innovations in efficient horse stable design to the origins of the Ku Klux Klan to critiques of ruin porn in modern-day Detroit . . . Dickey is always good company, an ideal companion to take along on a ghost tour: skeptical but prone to goosebumps, with an affinity for odd, morbid historical details.”
—The Los Angeles Review of Books
"A stunning work of architectural theory and a spell-binding collection of true-crime tales and historical drama."—The Atlantic's CityLab
"Dickey is one of the sharpest and most erudite writers around, and his new book makes for a perfect Halloween read."—Men's Journal
“Colin Dickey’s essays explore facets of the world that we might overlook, take readers to uncharted spaces, and delve into bizarre corners of history.”—Vol 1. Brooklyn
“Dickey takes an erudite tour of haunted America and tells us repeatedly that the meaning of ghost stories lies not in what they claim about the occult but in what they inadvertently say about the anxieties and prejudices of the teller and the larger society . . . His analytical and reportorial talents are evident . . . Part of the special delight of GHOSTLAND is its many informed asides, revealing Dickey’s long hours of spading up obscure facts and quotes . . . a bravura performance of storytelling, in an elegant prose style throughout that does not sacrifice intelligence for readability.”—Los Angeles Times
“Colin Dickey is a mad genius, and reading one of his books is as close to a look at his brilliant brain as we will get without use of a bone saw.”—BookRiot
“You wouldn’t expect to read about brothels, human psychology, Victorian architecture, even a suburban Toys R’ Us, and come out the other side with an entirely different understanding and appreciation for ghosts. But Colin Dickey’s writing is just that good. Ghostland is strange and un-settling in the best possible way.”—Caitlin Doughty, New York Times bestselling author of Smoke Gets in Your Eyes
“Always fascinating, sometimes horrifying. GHOSTLAND is a remarkable portrait of the ways that the walking dead—or our beliefs in them—wander through,
and shape, American history.”—Deborah Blum, author of The Poisoner’s Handbook
“Spine-tingling... A truly creepy travelogue that’s a must-have for Halloweeen.”—BookPage
“Come for the ghosts, stay for the history.”—Booklist
“Dickey pops sensationalist bubbles by observing the underlying racism, sexism, and classism associated with many hauntings’ long-told tales. By exposing historical inaccuracies and sociological calumny, the work treats readers to a better understanding of the socioeconomic and political milieu in which these myths gained acceptance, ultimately providing a richer, more nuanced narrative. Sophisticated readers with gothic sensibilities who enjoy literary histories, social commentary, and authoritative travelogs will find this a worthy title.”—Library Journal
Library Journal
09/01/2016
Dickey, author of Cranioklepty (grave robbers stealing the skulls of the brilliant) and Afterlives of the Saints (the long-lasting influence of holy weirdness), continues his exploration of the strange and macabre with this latest work. Each chapter is an essay revolving around a spooky site or sighting. The focus ranges from specific landmarks such as the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose, CA, to institutions such as Southern U.S. plantations or asylums to entire cities such as Salem, MA, and New Orleans—all supposed magnets for supernatural activity. While the author doesn't question the veracity of the apparitions, the narratives are not your typical "gee whiz" ghost stories. Dickey pops sensationalist bubbles by observing the underlying racism, sexism, and classism associated with many hauntings' long-told tales. By exposing historical inaccuracies and sociological calumny, the work treats readers to a better understanding of the socioeconomic and political milieu in which these myths gained acceptance, ultimately providing a richer, more nuanced narrative. VERDICT Sophisticated readers with gothic sensibilities who enjoy literary histories, social commentary, and authoritative travelogs will find this a worthy title.—Janet Tapper, Univ. of Western States Lib., Portland, OR
NOVEMBER 2016 - AudioFile
One might expect that listening to a book about ghosts should be avoided at night. However, Colin Dickey’s history is more academic than scary, and Jon Lindstrom’s narration reflects that approach. As such, there’s no risk of sensationalizing the topic. But this more formal narration style may limit the attraction to the audio. Although the narration varies in pace and tone, and Lindstrom’s voice is comfortable and reassuring, the nonfiction tenor of the material is strong. One difficulty in this performance is that it’s often tough to differentiate the author’s words from quoted materials. Listening will work best for those who have an interest in the topic. S.C.E. © AudioFile 2016, Portland, Maine
Kirkus Review
2016-07-31
“If you want to understand a place, ignore the boasting monuments and landmarks, and go straight to the haunted houses.”So begins Dickey’s (Creative Writing/National Univ.; Afterlives of the Saints: Stories from the Ends of Faith, 2012 etc.) exploration into the ghost stories of America and what they reveal about society. On his quest, the author examines every manner of haunted place, from houses like the Seven Gables in Salem, Massachusetts, which inspired Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Gothic romance of the same name, to haunted cities like New Orleans as well as asylums, cemeteries, battlefields, and haunted hotels. While not a new concept, Dickey’s theme has been more extensively explored where fairy tales and general folklore are concerned. In each location, the author reveals not only the ghost stories of the site, but also, most importantly, the site’s true history. This allows us to see how ghost stories often say “more about the tellers than they do about the supernatural.” Throughout history, ghost stories have been used to make money, offer a moral, mark a location, and explain the unexplainable, among many other functions. Interwoven throughout the narrative are the voices of writers and thinkers including Nabokov, Freud, Poe, Dickens, and Stephen King. Most revealing is the author’s examination of the logical factors that contribute to hauntings—e.g., hotels feel eerie because they are uncannily not home, and homes often feel haunted because they have been abandoned. While the histories of the locations are well-expressed, Dickey’s personal experiences can feel flat. The investigation feels especially poignant when he connects the nature of ghost stories to issues like race. Places like Shockoe Bottom in Richmond, where hundreds of black men, women, and children were tortured and buried, should surely offer up their share of ghosts, but most of the spirits have been white. “What does it mean to whitewash the spirits of a city?” Dickey asks. “Does Virginia have ghosts that it is not yet ready to face?” An intriguing but somewhat uneven exploration of things unseen.
