Occult Science

Today the names of H. P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, August Derleth, and Clark Ashton Smith, all regular contributors to the pulp magazine Weird Tales during the first half of the twentieth century, are recognizable even to casual readers and listeners of the bizarre and fantastic. And yet despite being more popular than them all during the golden era of genre pulp fiction, there is another author whose name and work have fallen into obscurity: Seabury Quinn. Quinn's short stories were featured in well more than half of Weird Tales's original publication run.

Over 100 years ago, a group of witches escaping a second wave of Witch Trials made their way from New England to Whitewater, Wisconsin, known as Second Salem. Others, seeking knowledge in spiritualism and the occult, also made their way to the city and, through their ignorance, unleashed an evil entity poised to destroy the city. Three sisters, the Willoughby Witches, created an incantation strong enough to ensnare the demon.

Occult investigator Quincey Morris and his "consultant", white witch Libby Chastain, are hired to free a family from a deadly curse that appears to date back to the Salem witch trials. Fraught with danger, the trail finds them stalking the mysterious occult underworlds of Boston, San Francisco, New Orleans, and New York, searching out the root of the curse. After surviving a series of terrifying attempts on their lives, the two find themselves drawn inexorably towards Salem itself - and the very heart of darkness.

It's the dead of night; you are fast asleep. Suddenly, you are wide awake but unable to move. Hunched over you in the shadows is an eight- or nine-foot-tall gaunt entity with spider-thin limbs, dressed in an old-style black suit, its pale face missing eyes, nose, ears, and mouth. You finally manage to cry out. The monstrous thing disappears as suddenly as it appeared. You just had a terrifying encounter with the Slenderman. Who - or what - is the Slenderman? His existence began on the Internet, but he didn't stay online.

The charmingly eccentric Otto Draxinger appears to be your typical pipe-smoking Oxford professor, doing his best to preserve his sanity while his beloved former students are being slaughtered at the Western Front. But the American expatriate has diagnosed himself with the newly coined term “schizophrenia”. And he believes the nightmarish waking visions he’s been experiencing are caused by the psychological trauma of the catastrophe that is The Great War.

A man's body is found below a waterfall. It looks like suicide or an accidental drowning – until DI Frannie Bliss enters the dead man's home. What he finds there has him consulting Merrily Watkins, the Diocese of Hereford's official advisor on the paranormal.

Known throughout Tennessee as "Old Kate", the Bell Witch took up residence with John Bell's family in 1818. It was a cruel and noisy spirit, given to knocking and gnawing sounds before finding its own voices. With these voices and supernatural acts, the Bell Witch tormented the Bell family. The extraordinary tale recounts the only documented case in U.S. History when a spirit "actually caused a man's death".

Bowart's Operation Mind Control: The Cryptocracy's Plan to Psychocivilize You is a classic in the annals of conspiracy research. It is a disturbing account of the secret use of mind control technology, by a secret government (or "cryptocracy"), with an aim to pacifying whole populations and furthering private global-investment strategies. Meticulously researched and well-written, it remains - even today - one of the best books on the topic.

As war rages in 1944, young army lieutenant Lucas Athan recovers a sarcophagus excavated from an Egyptian tomb. Shipped to Princeton University for study, the box contains mysteries that only Lucas, aided by brilliant archaeologist Simone Rashid, can unlock. These mysteries may, in fact, defy - or fulfill - the dire prophecies of Albert Einstein himself.

There is a vampire war brewing in the underworld and at the center of it all is Damali Richards, spoken word artist and Vampire Huntress. But she is not just any Vampire Huntress, she is the millenium Neteru: a woman so potentially powerful that the vampire world is about to invoke a bloody battle that threatens to spill over onto her streets in order to possess her. It's just a matter of who will get to her first.

Ancient and classical societies have always had an ideal of manhood. In Japan, the samurai cultivated not only the art of the sword, but also poetry, calligraphy, and spiritual practice. In Confucianism, the ideal man was the Chun-Tzu (the Higher Man), who cultivated both the arts of war and the arts of peace. And in medieval Europe, the knight lived by the comparable code of chivalry. Such men, considered both warriors and mystics, exemplified wholeness. Yet today, men exist in a chaotic world without role models, guidance, or a sense of the sacred masculine.

There is never a good time for a witch to lose her powers. But to lose your magic just when you and your friends need it to survive might be the worst timing of all. But even in her despair, Torie Bliss has noticed some strange goings-on in Singing Falls. The supernatural community seems to be at war with itself, and the human inhabitants of the community are not exactly acting like normal humans. Without her powers Torie is at a loss as to how she can help them. But there is one person who may be able to help her.

In a future uncomfortably close to the present day, the apocalypse has surpassed all expectations. Hideous demons roam the streets in an orgy of terror, drawing pleasure from torturing humans as sadistically as possible. Ira, a young San Francisco artist, becomes involved with a strange group of scientists and philosophers desperately trying to end the bloody siege. But the most shocking revelation is yet to come.

Brought to Cuba as slaves, the Yoruba people of West Africa preserved their religion's heritage by disguising their gods as Catholic saints and worshipping them in secret. The resulting religion is known as Santeria, a blend of primitive magic and Catholicism now practiced by an estimated five million Americans. Santeria: The Religion is an informative and insightful examination of an African religion's survival in the New World.

Irresistibly drawn to mysteries, if only to debunk them, reporter Lionel Page exposes supernatural frauds, swindlers, and charlatans. His latest case is an obsession—at least for an ancient and wealthy heiress: verify the authenticity of a lost Edgar Allan Poe manuscript circulating through New York City’s literary underworld. But the shrewd Regina Dunkle offers more than money. It’s a pact. Fulfill her request, and Lionel’s own notorious buried past, one he’s been running from since he was a child, will remain hidden.

On the night the traitor was killed, a dangerous murderer disappeared. Fiona just wants things to go back to normal, but the town and her coven are in turmoil. When Fiona is attacked by a demonic wolf, she and Gabriel discover a tear in the veil. Demons are escaping from the Underworld in droves, killing their mortal hosts. The police are baffled by the mysterious deaths, and Fiona is the only one who can stop them. The trouble is that Fiona doesn’t know the first thing about slaying demons. To harness the power that is her birthright, she’s going to need Gabriel’s help.

These lectures were intended by Ouspensky as introductory material for people interested in the work in England. This material is still unmatched as a brief statement of the work's psychological ideas. Designed to be read aloud at weekly meetings of small groups of people interested in the work, they are almost a basic primer of Gurdjieff's psychological ideas on consciousness and spiritual development.

Riptide, Oregon, 1983. A sleepy coastal town, where crime usually consists of underage drinking down at a Wolf Point bonfire. But then, strange things start happening. A human skeleton is unearthed in a local park, and mutilated animals begin appearing, seemingly sacrificed, on the town's beaches. The Mercy of the Tide follows four people drawn irrevocably together by a recent tragedy as they do their best to reclaim their lives - leading them all to a discovery that will change them and their town forever.

At early childhood, Linda Deir experienced something most of us miss - she realized she was being guided. Now, after a lifetime of being guided, she shares what she has learned and how she learned it. A survivor of child abuse, at 20 months old, baby Linda knew her life was in danger. Unloved, abused, and out of options, she ran away from home. Two policemen found her miles from home, barefoot and in diapers, running down the median of a busy California expressway.

Written by Wayne Liquorman with characteristic humor, irreverence, and profound insight, this audiobook provides a bold new look at the nature of existence. If one wants to remain in the moment, what does one do about the mind? Never mind! The mind does what the mind does. It is working and functioning perfectly, doing exactly what it has been designed and programmed to do. The audiobook hammers away at the basic misconceptions that bring about human suffering - I could have and should have done it differently, I am flawed, I am the author of my thoughts, feelings, and actions.