The Haunting of the Presidents: A Parnormal History of the U.S. Presidency

I was disappointed in this book. Much of it was written in a very dry style. The writers insisted on including their pet conspiracy theories in the mix. Sources included lots of "anonymous" folks, tabloids, and other questionable witnesses. There was a lot of speculation about how certain words and actions of people might suggest a supernatural experience of which they'd not spoken. I found the chapter on Nancy Reagan's astrologer absolutely boring, and the one about Hillary Clinton "channeling" Eleanor Roosevelt silly -- sounds like she was simply engaging in an imaginative exercise of WWED (what would Eleanor do?). Then there was the final chapter about the mediums "channeling" the presidents -- not my cuppa.

Oh, and then there was show more some questionable organization. For instance, the chapter titled "Presidential Birthplaces" included a lot of sites that were not presidential birthplaces, and very few places where presidents were actually born. There was also a fair amount of repetition between the different sections.

Within the dross, there were a few pearls of stories that appeared to have some documentation. I enjoyed those, but not enough to make it worthwhile slogging through 400 pages of this stuff. show less

I didn't like this book as well as I thought I would. I did read bits and pieces of it that were interesting, but for the most part this book read more like a history book than a paranormal book, in my opinion.