An old friend from high school, Nick, writes videogame reviews. Recently, however, he wrote an unsolicited review of my latest book, Ghostlore of Illinois Colleges and Universities. I was surprised and delighted that he chose to read my latest offering, since he (by his own admission) rarely reads nonfiction.
The review is fair and generally positive. In response to one of his criticisms, the book is not just a collection of stories–it is meant to be a combination of stories and the theory behind them. That is why I spend so much time discussing folklore and ghost stories in their relation to university culture.
Check out an excerpt of the review below or read it in its entirety.
He doesn’t want to convince me that genuine ghosts haunt the various Illinois universities. Instead, this book would rather discuss the stories that are being told and examine the history that inspired them.
It’s the combination of history and legend that makes the stories that are told interesting. This book focuses on Illinois campuses specifically, so everything begins with the location. The surface level is the story itself. The legend. What people say happened there. Beneath that is the truth, but much like the story itself the truth is fragmented. Partially documented history only tells so much.
The strongest part of the book is the history that it manages to document. It’s interesting to learn about the history of the universities themselves, unrelated to the ghost story that emerged from it. It’s even more fascinating tracking a story from its roots to the glorious legend it is today.
M.A. Kleen 