April ScaredyKIT: Paranormal

Welcome to the April ScaredyKIT thread where our topic is paranormal.

The Oxford on-line dictionary defines paranormal as: denoting events or phenomena such as telekinesis or clairvoyance that are beyond the scope of normal scientific understanding.

According to Wikipedia, it encompasses a lot, including extrasensory perception (ESP), telekinesis, ghosts, poltergeists, life after death, reincarnation, faith healing and human auras. It also includes UFOs, but not established scientific research into the search for extraterrestrial life. Creatures like Bigfoot and the Lochness monster are also included.

Since we have other topics this year that cover some of these subjects, let's leave out haunted places (which we are covering this month). In June we have cryptids and legendary creatures, so let's leave out Bigfoot and the Lochness monster, etc. And we have the occult in May, which seems to overlap a bit also (supernatural, mystical, magical).

So, I would suggest we focus on all aspects of ESP, including telepathy, clairvoyance and telekinesis, ghosts (including poltergeists), life after death and reincarnation, faith healing, human auras and UFOs.

If there is anything here that folks think overlaps too much with our May topic of the occult, please let me know and we'll tighten the boundaries a bit more! In any case, I think there are lots of options.

Some books that immediately came to mind for me on ESP include Firestarter, The Shining (and its sequel, Doctor Sleep) and The Dead Zone by Stephen King and Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs. For reincarnation, The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August by Claire North, Life After Life by Kate Atkinson, Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell and Audrey Rose by Frank de Felitta. Lots of great ghost stories out there including Twentieth Century Ghosts by Joe Hill and The Small Hand by Susan Hill.

I'm planning on reading Dead and Gone by Charlaine Harris where the protagonist, Sookie Stackhouse, is a telepath.

Please share what you plan on reading and don't forget to update the wiki.

Thanks for the great intro to this topic! It sounds like we have three months of "paranormal activity" ahead of us, so it was a good idea to narrow the topic scope a bit.

Library is closed for who knows how long, which narrows my choices somewhat, but I have a feeling something on my shelves will fit.

>2 sturlington: My library in Minnesota is also closed. I was there last Friday.

Going by it's "Paranormal" tag, I have a book on my Kindle that I think will work for this topic. The Three by Sarah Lotz. The blurb says "4 simultaneous plane crashes. 4 survivors - 3 are children. All are changed"

I have Library of Souls, the third in the Peculiar Children series, on the shelf.

Great intro. Not sure if I can comply this month. Library is closed, most of the books mentioned here are not available at my library or have an extensive wait list. I may have to sneak in something in like ghost/haunted places. I have 3-4 of them. But I will keep searching and put my name on the list for several books at the library. Paranormal is just something I would never read, so I have no inventory!

>6 Tess_W: Thanks - good luck with your reading. A ghost story totally fits, if you have something like that!

>6 Tess_W: I suspect the situation in the country may affect the ability of many to participate in some challenges.

>8 thornton37814: Maybe we just get super creative with how we interpret the challenges? I like to see what everyone is reading, even if it may not strictly fit the theme.

>8 thornton37814: >9 sturlington: Interesting point. Maybe, just for this time period when people may want to join in but can't get a book that fits, we allow movie reviews to count? For example, someone wanted to read Firestarter for this challenge, couldn't get it, so watched the movie.

>10 mstrust: That's a great idea, especially if the movie is based on a book.

I like the idea of being super-creative and think that however you want to participate works!

I had another idea, since many of us may not be able to get our planned books this month. That is, if you can't read your planned selection during the theme month but still want to participate, just read it later in the year and let us all know what month it was chosen for at that time. You can post in the original thread and/or in that month's thread so we'll be sure to see it.

>13 sturlington: That works for sure!

I just found another book that would work for this month - Crossfire by Miyuki Miyabe, which I picked up because it's on the 1001 books you must read before you die list. Reading the jacket description, the protagonist has the ability to start fires using willpower, and she uses this power to punish violent criminals.

After much searching, I think I'm just going to go with Grayson Manor Haunting. On LT it's tagged as: paranormal, ghosts, levitation. And also YA....but I'm going with it!

>13 sturlington: I tend to do that, anyway (occasionally). I still aim for the "proper" month, but if I need an ILL that takes a while or something, I come back later and post to the proper thread at that time.

I am going to cover a little bit of everything by reading Time-Life Books' Phantom Encounters.

I came across Die seltene Gabe while looking for something else in my TBR and found that the main character is a telekinetic, so it fits here, haha. A taut, well-written thriller for young adults.

I just finished Livewire, Volume 2 by Vita Ayala -- this series is about a protagonist with electricity-controlling powers, and this volume focuses on a program for children with psionic powers.

Has anybody read The thousand autumns of Jacob de Zoet or The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell?
Apparently both are part of a series, and while the second appears to be paranormal, the first one does not.

I was really impressed with Cloud Atlas and would like to seize the occasion to explore Mitchell's works further but I most probably won't be able to read both books if I need to get to the second to fit this month's theme.

>21 chlorine: Yes, I've read them both. The Bone Clocks is definitely paranormal. The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet is more straightforwardly historical, although there are hints of the supernatural.

Also, if you liked Cloud Atlas, then I think you would find The Bone Clocks to be more like that than Autumns. Hope this helps!

ETA They are not a series. They are very, very loosely linked by a character crossover but both books stand alone.

I've read an ARC I won from LT. Tales from the Fringes of Fear is a children's collection of horror stories featuring ghosts, weird creatures and a Golem.

>22 sturlington: Great, thanks for the answer, it helps a lot! Th Bone Clocks will most probably be my choice for this month then!

Grayson Manor Haunting by Cheryl Bradshaw was book 1/4 of the Addie Lockheart paranormal series. I'm not a paranormal fan by any means, but this book wasn't bad. At first, I thought the focus of the book was going to be on the haunting, but it was more specifically about a young woman who had psychic experiences in her childhood that were repressed by her parents. When her parents were gone and she moved into a house with a spirit, that power returned to her. Addie finds out that she is a medium, as were both her mother and grandmother. 287 pages 3 stars

I have completed my read of The Three by Sarah Lotz. This was a high concept paranormal thriller involving plane crashes and some very unusual children.

I finished Dead and Gone yesterday - the ninth book in the Southern Vampire Mysteries series - and it was a good one! The book starts with the shapeshifters and were-animals of the world revealing their true nature; since the vampires did it a few years back, these supes (supernaturals) figured it was safe to do as well. And it doesn't go that badly. However, it does get some people riled up. This time, Sookie Stackhouse, the telepath waitress in Bon Temps, Louisiana, gets caught in the middle of a fairy war. But first she is trying, again, to make sure her brother doesn't go to jail for another ghastly murder - this time of a werepanther, her brother's ex-wife, who gets crucified. I really enjoyed this one.

The Lace Reader / Brunonia Barry
4 stars

Sophya left home in Salem, Mass. for California a while back, and hasn’t returned... until now, when her elderly great-aunt, who, in-part, raised her, went missing. The women in her family have an ability to “read lace”, sort of like seeing a future. While home, Sophya, confronts her past, and her family’s past (including violence and abuse), while falling for a local police officer, though they are both a little bit socially awkward.

I had a bit of trouble with this at the start, as there were so many characters to figure out who was who and how they related to each other. Maybe half way through, I figured out the majority of them. There was a lot going on in this story and I didn’t even touch on most of it in my summary. I did like the storyline with Sophya and the cop. I also liked the setting of Salem – I’ve been there once, as a tourist, so it was fun to picture it. Overall, I really liked this. I was surprised at the ending and it’s one where I feel like I should go back and reread, knowing what I know now. (But, I never do... and if I ever did, there would likely be a big enough gap that I will have forgotten, anyway!).

Just posted May's thread:
https://www.librarything.com/topic/319004

I finished In the Night Wood by Dale Bailey, which is about ancient Horned Kings and fey and woods within woods. It's a good premise, a wonderful setting, and a gorgeous cover, but I can't recommend it for reasons. See my thread or the book page for the full review, which has some mild spoilers and cursing.

>30 sturlington: Thumbs up. I haven't read it, but you've got some valid reasons for not liking it.

The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell started out well but failed to deliver IMO. (very minor spoilers below)

The book follows a loose group of characters, over a 60 years span approximately. These characters are linked with groups of people who are somewhat immortal, some of these being the good guys and the others the bad guys. I was fed up with the manichaeism of this novel (though there are pointers at the fact that this is more complicated by that, I was not convinced by these pointers). I was a bit appalled at the fact that the good guys decided, without much thought apparently, that the correct way to stop the bad guys from harming people was to kill them. The immortal people have some psychic powers that seem to go all over the place, and I disliked the jargon that designed this power (why 'suasion' rather than 'persuasion', for instance?) There's an epic battle scene using these powers that felt ludicrous.

I really like the premise of this book but it really did not work for me, which is a pity since I liked Cloud Altas so much.

I finished my second book for this theme this morning - The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August - which I really enjoyed. It's about reincarnation, but not in the way we commonly think of it (i.e., we die and we are reincarnated in another body, and maybe even an animal or plant); Harry is reincarnated in the same body over and over again, remembering his previous lives. I was reminded of the movie Groundhog Day, but this goes in a whole different direction - great book!

I'm going to start Crossfire today, which is about a woman who can start fires with her mind. Not 100% sure I will finish by tomorrow, but I'll give it a try!

>33 LisaMorr: I read The first fifteen Lives of Harry August a few years ago and really enjoyed it as well! I thought the plot idea was very clever. Apparently Replay by Ken Grimwood has a somewhat similar setting and this made me want to read it but I still haven't gotten around to it.

I read The House on the Strand by Daphne du Maurier and it will fit this tag. The setting is Cornwall and blends Gothic romance and supernatural genre with a drug that transports the narrator back to the 1400s.

I finished The House of War and Witness. Won't go down as my favourite book that Mike Carey has had a hand in but at least it improved towards the end. Lots of ghostly goings on.

I read The Saturday Night Ghost Club, which sounded like it would be chock full of the paranormal. It was actually a very interesting coming of age story that had just two very brief ghostly incidents.

I finished Crossfire on May 2 - it's a book on the 1001 books you must read before you die list and is about a young Japanese woman who has the ability to set fires using her mind, or pyrokinesis, and the police officers investigating a series of vengeance killings. It was well done.

Thanks for joining Paranormal month and sharing your reads!