Along with reading and writing about ghosts, zombies, monsters, and myths of all persuasions, I’m also endlessly fascinated by the history and culture surrounding these legends. My curiosity was satiated when I found myself glued to the pages of The Complete Idiot’s Guide to the Paranormal and The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Zombies.

Intrigued by the difference between a poltergeist and a possession? Ever wonder why Japan seems to be absolutely brimming with creepy mythology? Curious about angel and demon lore? I could go on and on about Paranormal, but I’ll just give you a few interesting tidbits from this book.

Tidbit #1: Physical necromancy is pretty gross, since it involves using actual corpses to recall spirits from the afterlife. But it doesn’t get much worse than anthropomancy, which also involves mutilation of the human body, except… the body isn’t dead. Usually they disembowel the (still living) person and examine signs in their spilled entrails. Lovely.

Tidbit #2: Spontaneous human combustion has, apparently, actually happened. People just randomly burn into ashes, like Mary Reeser in 1951, whose ashy remains would have needed heat of 3,000°F in order to incinerate her. That’s pretty damn hot. And get this: nothing else in her house was so much as charred.

Tidbit #3: A Nepalese girl named Sarita spouts little triangles of glass from her forehead. By 2006, she had emitted a total of 130 shards. From her forehead. Nobody has any clue how.

Tidbit #4: Cryptozoology is the study of animals or creatures that are thought to be extinct or legendary. These include the chupacabra, the Japanese frilled shark, and old Nessie.

Instead of giving us an overview of a lot of different topics, Zombies delves deeply into one. From the origin of zombies to zombie cinema, it’s pretty much everything you ever wanted to know about the undead.

Tidbit #1: The idea of zombies comes from Haitian Voodoo (Vodun, actually). It was believed that certain priests, called bokors, who practiced left-hand magic (the bad kind), could bring people back from the dead and control them. Turns out they used a special “zombie powder,” a cocktail of drugs, to make it seem as if the person was really dead, and then they would just dig them up. After that, they’d be so mentally damaged from the dangerous drugs, they actually thought they were zombies.

Tidbit #2: Zombies originally moved slowly because they’ve experienced rigor mortis, causing their limbs to stiffen—hence the famous zombie gait of Night of the Living Dead. More recent zombies do not appear to suffer this side-effect of death.

Tidbit #3: There are real life zombie survivalist groups. Look it up.

These guides are really perfect for horror writers (I was inundated with new ideas) and just people who are curious about the history of supernatural myths. They were both written by Nathan Robert Brown, a doctoral student of mythological studies. Great for a bit of light reading!

Buy now:

The Complete Idiot’s Guide to the Paranormal

The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Zombies