The Occult Section

Keep Out! by Nick Redfern

“Keep Out!” by Nick Redfern

I think it’s pretty safe to say that most people are at least tangentially aware of Area 51, the top secret military base in the Nevada desert that supposedly is the testing ground for captured UFOs, as well as top secret military aircraft. Most people have also probably heard of Hangar 18, another military stronghold that reportedly is the home of little men from outer space. But I’m guessing most people have not heard of the Dugway Proving Ground, the underground base at Dulce, New Mexico, or Porton Down. In his new book “Keep Out!”, author Nick Redfern details a whole litany of top secret installations, including Area 51 and Hangar 18 as well as some lesser-known but equally as enigmatic locations. Some of these top secret facilities are only rumored to exist, while others are in fact real installations, and only the true motives of these facilities are in question.

Unlike Redfern’s last book that I reviewed, “The Real Men in Black,” which was more or less a chronological telling of the legend and lore of the enigmatic entities, “Keep Out” is written in a more encyclopedic style, so you can choose your chapter of interest and not worry about missing anything in prior chapters. And when Redfern references something in a previous or upcoming chapter, he dutifully informs the reader where to find such information. Though I recommend reading the entire book, as each chapter has its own unique charm and mystery.

The tagline for “Keep Out!” is “Top secret places governments don’t want you to know about.” And indeed, Redfern explores secret bases that are controlled by many of the world’s governments, not just the United States. Redfern details the Pine Gap in Australia, a facility that is allegedly in existence for intelligence-gathering for anti-terrorist activities, but is surrounded by rumors of UFO activity. Puerto Rico is explored for its alleged animal testing facilities, which many think could be the origin of the island’s most famous cryptid, el chupacabra. Various nations, including Norway, are shown to have enormous survival bunkers, either for the 2012 doomsday (which Redfern deftly debunks) or some other, unbeknownst to the public, imminent catastrophe. Redfern also details evidence that there may even be military bases on the moon (some man made, and some of extraterrestrial origin), and if not, proves that at the very least, the United States was at one point very interested in the possibility. One of my favorite chapters details the tunnels under London, and what may be lurking there, from escaped big cats, deranged mental patients, to ghosts and government experiments gone horribly wrong.

Not everything in the book is related to the paranormal. Many of the facilities are rumored to have fairly earthly, though still terrifying, operations, such as biological warfare, weather manipulation, remote viewing and human testing. Typical conspiracy theory fodder. But other installations are rumored to be experimenting with concepts that stretch the limits of belief, such as time travel, teleportation, and even physical manifestations of thoughts. The Montauk Project (close to home for me), HAARP, the Philadelphia Experiment, and more can all be found within the pages of “Keep Out!”

The Good: Nick Redfern, as usual, presents a very thorough and broad look at various facilities around the globe. But don’t equate thoroughness to blandness, as Redfern always keeps the narrative moving at a quick pace and peppers the tales with his witty brand of humor (some would say nerdy, but hey, I’m a nerd as well, so it’s right up my alley). Redfern also pokes tons of holes in the 2012 myth, which pleased me as there seems to be no shortage of TV shows and books basically predicting our doom come December. Redfern shows exactly why the theories are wrong, and does so quite succinctly and effectively. One of my criticisms of “The Real Men in Black” was that Redfern seemed to buy into some of the more outlandish theories, and I’m happy to see that he stayed a bit more objective for “Keep Out!” I never judge anyone for their beliefs (I do run a paranormal blog, after all) but rational explanations should always win out over paranormal ones, unless there is evidence to the contrary. And with these secret facilities, Redfern had a lot more evidence to build his cases on.

The Bad: I mentioned earlier about how Redfern keeps the narratives moving at a quick pace, but sometimes the narrative is too quick. With certain stories, I felt that there was so much more to the tale, and that it was simply glossed over. Tales for another book, one would hope, but as a paranormal investigator myself, I am voracious in my quest for answers, and it’s a bit frustrating to get that carrot dangled and not hear the rest of the known story. It only happens a few times during the course of the book, but even a few extra paragraphs of explanation would have at least filled in those gaps.

The Ugly: I don’t have much to say for this category. Some of the pictures would have done better if presented in color or a higher resolution, but I’m basically nitpicking. And I also need new glasses.

The Bottom Line: A great book for a niche look on conspiracy theories, “Keep Out!” is a must for your collection if you are even remotely interested in the paranormal aspects of governmental conspiracies. Lot’s of well-researched yet little-known (to the general public) stories about secret installations that are in all likelihood researching far more than they would like any of us to know. Some of the theories are a little hard to believe, others are just disturbing to think about, but I guarantee the book will make you think. And Redfern’s writing style makes you feel like you’re being told a spooky story from an old friend with inside info. Highly recommended.

Final Score: 90%

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“The Ghost Way” by Lance Smith tells the story of the Ramanakajja family – father Jak, mother Eot and their four daughters – and how the family lived for a brief time on “The Ghost Way,” or land that is supposedly forever doomed to be roamed by demons. Set in Thailand, and written as a 100% true story, the book has a lot to offer.

There were quite a few things I enjoyed about the book. As someone who is admittedly not familiar with Thai culture at all, the descriptions of holidays, beliefs, and ceremonies was very interesting. I found myself googling Thai phrases, food, and drinks that were mentioned in the narrative, in order to learn more about them. I’m the type of person that needs to be able to fully imagine the scene as it’s being set, so I also inadvertently learned a lot about the Thai landscape.

The story itself is fascinating. Taken at face value, it’s honestly terrifying.

However, with that said, I cannot fully buy into the story as being completely true for several reasons. And I feel as though it is important to mention this as Smith is careful with his words. It is not “based on a true story” but instead written simply as “a true story,” not only a few times in the book, but also on the front cover.

At the end of the book you find out the story was told to Smith 30 years later, with remarkable clarity and attention to detail.  It seems as if even Smith knows how unreal it sounds and tries to convince the reader otherwise. (“Hair stood up on Eot’s arms when she started to speak and her eyes never blinked once or looked away. I realized at that moment that no detective or polygraph could ever doubt her word.”)

While I of course believe in the paranormal, the way the story is presented is over the top. Presented as fact are multiple sightings and interactions with demons, including one scene where a woman has sex with a demon. In another scene, a large fish escapes through a fishing net by “melting” through it and reforming itself outside the net.

In addition to the family’s experiences, which are recounted 30 years later as being complete truth, Smith also includes stories of non-family members. One story in particular that stands out is that of a character who encounters a demon while driving and plunges over a cliff. With no mention of witnesses to this event, how can this be claimed as truth?

Finally, several of the experiences the family had in the beginning of the book seemed based entirely on the phenomenon known as sleep paralysis.

The book is a translated narrative, so the writing style is not quite what you’d expect. It moves quickly, and at times appears disjointed, though I feel this does not take away from the story, and may even enhance the frantic feeling the author wishes to convey.

All in all, I did enjoy reading the book, though from the very beginning I took everything stated as fact with a large grain of salt.

Technorati Tags: Book Review, book reviews, books, debunking, Eot Ramanakajja, ghost, ghost hunters, ghost hunting, ghosts, haunted, haunted house, haunted houses, haunting, hoax, jak Ramanakajja, Lance Smith, paranormal, people, Ramanakajja, supernatural, Thailand, The Ghost Way, thoughts

In his 2009 book Super Consciousness, Colin Wilson describes the phenomenon of what he calls peak experiences. These moments of extreme realization and observation might not be common experiences, but they do happen with some repetition in healthy individuals. In fact, studies have shown that the more aware of this we become, the more likely a peak experience is to occur.

Peak experiences can explain many oddities and otherwise unexplainable event. So called “occult” experiences, Wilson goes on to say, can clearly be explained through the lens of these peak experiences. This includes things such as clairvoyance and telepathy. There have been dozens, if not hundreds, of documented occurrences of these phenomena, some of which Wilson draws upon as examples. This happens because of the simple fact that our brains filter out much of the information that they intake. How many times have you driven your car home late at night only to arrive at your home and not remember parts of the trip? Our brains fly on autopilot for the vast majority of the mundane tasks we act out on a daily basis. This leads to a severe limitation of observation and thus potential. This is a kind of robot effect on human awareness.

Everything changes when we experience super consciousness. During these times, we become aware of much more of our surroundings and the world around us. Things that we thought were impossible suddenly become feasible and realistic. Our five senses are extremely limited in our observations of the world, this suggests. In this light, it becomes evident that there are things that we cannot be aware of unless we increase our level of observation somehow. The “real world” that we live in is therefore only a slice of actual reality. When we are in the midst of a peak experience, true reality is exposed to a higher degree. While it is impossible for man to comprehend the totality of our universe and even more impossible to describe it with words, we can at least take an active role in a tiny part of it.

The ending of the book is devoted to the real life application of peak experiences. For starters, Wilson is adamant that most philosophy is too passive for such an experience. Experiencing the real world necessitates action and doing, rather than sitting and thinking. He concludes his look at the peak experience with a how-to guide for experiencing your own version of this phenomenon. Wilson claims that with practice, you can experience a peak experience on your own volition.

This book stands out because of the extremely detailed look that Wilson takes at the past and how the peak experience has been portrayed over time. He uses the 19^th century fascination with hypnosis as an example. A hypnotized individual is capable of things that they might otherwise deem impossible, but by unlocking normally unused sections of the brain, these impossibilities become givens. This elusive concept has been acknowledged as a part of human nature since at least the days of the Old Testament. By outlining his case with a slew of historical examples, Wilson creates a solid case for the human race’s ability to expand their consciousness. Call it super consciousness, peak experiences, mystical visions, or religious enlightenment, this phenomenon has the ability to make an otherwise normal person operate on a higher plane, if only for a brief moment.

Technorati Tags: colin wilson, ESP, occult, paranormal, peak experience, super consciousness

H.P. Lovecraft

In his essay “Supernatural Horror in Literature,” H.P. Lovecraft explains that fear is the oldest and most basic human emotion. Fear of the unknown is the root of all fear, as death and pain are more prominent within the human mind than something like pleasure is. As a result, we tend to put more emphasis on these negative emotions and put more thought into what their outcomes might happen to be. Lovecraft was a master of explaining away the unknown and filling it with a higher degree of fear—his stories revolve around filling the emptiness with something even scarier than the unknown: malevolence. Not only was that gaping blankness something that was impossible to understand, it was something that intended to hurt you.

Many literary experts have attempted to root out Lovecraft’s sources of inspiration. Some are not content with the idea that Lovecraft was just extremely imaginative—these authorities want to look into some sort of supernatural explanation. The fact is that Lovecraft was very well read and well educated about the roots of supernatural literature. This alone could account for his creative license.

Lovecraft’s writing was a huge “what if.” His works used the entire universe as his canvas, not just the Earth and its human occupants. Lovecraft insisted that human traits had no place in cosmological phenomena. Therefore, a new set of traits, a “weird” set, was necessary. So Lovecraft needed to create a new set of standards by which to explain his characters and otherworldly occurrences.

By Lovecraft’s definition, a weird tale is something that cannot possibly happen. Therefore, it can be assumed that Lovecraft simply did not believe that the fantastic, that the supernatural, was possible. The art that Lovecraft cherished so much, then, was to him more a rhetorical question than a statement of what he believed to be true.

Lovecraft’s debunking of the supernatural world is quite well known, but many people simply are not convinced. Just because Lovecraft didn’t believe that this was real does not prove that this was the case. Supernatural forces could very well have been at play within Lovecraft’s dreams—these were a big source of inspiration for him and provided him with countless subjects for future stories. Simply dismissing the supernatural influence from Lovecraft’s writing is shortsighted. If this theory is correct, Lovecraft was an able vessel for supernatural forces. Dreams and ideas may have been broadcast to him and he simply relayed the messages. This could explain stories like “Beyond the Wall of Sleep,” where a man is brought to a mental institution that, when asleep, relays strange messages from celestial beings. Lovecraft’s drastic inclusion of dreams within his writing gives this theory a bit more weight than other ideas may have.

It is clear that Lovecraft was influenced by his musings and studies on the supernatural. Whether or not this is an indication that he actually was subject to supernatural forces is a mystery that will never be solved. At best, we can say that Lovecraft was not explicitly aware of any such influence. But the works he produced open many doors to those looking for answers that only supernatural occurrences can answer.

Technorati Tags: Book Review, book reviews, books, Dreams, H.P. Lovecraft, paranormal, supernatural, thoughts

The Real Men in Black by Nick Redfern

“The Real Men in Black” by Nick Redfern

Whether people are interested in UFO lore or not, most are at least marginally aware of the phenomenon known as the Men in Black. This is due in large part to the 1997 Will Smith/Tommy Lee Jones movie entitled (ironically enough) “Men in Black.” And while the movie was entertaining (which can’t be said of the dreadful sequel), it really didn’t explore the darker and more disturbing aspects of the Men in Black that have been reported for decades. Although Men in Black are mentioned in almost every UFO book or encyclopedia of the paranormal, not many books exist out there that really delve into the history of these enigmatic entities. Nick Redfern’s new book “The Real Men in Black” attempts to tell the strange narrative, from its origins in the 1940s right up until the present day.

Men in Black, simply put, are men (who usually pose as agents of some sort of unspecified government agency) who visit UFO witnesses. They usually exhibit very strange behavior, talk in odd speech patterns, drive older model cars, and generally try to scare UFO witnesses into keeping quiet and handing over any UFO evidence they may have. Oh, and they wear lots of black. Usually black suits, black ties, black fedora-type hats, and even (usually) have black hair.

The first part of the book, called “The Case Files,” details the stories of the Men in Black (or MIB) from their beginnings in era-by-era chapters. Starting with Albert Bender, an occult and UFO enthusiast, and his friend Gray Barker, Redfern delves into the murky origins of the strange visitors who don’t seem entirely human and who seemingly want nothing more than to scare UFO witnesses into silence. Many personal stories are shared, from such well-known figures in the paranormal as Brad Steiger, John Keel and Loren Coleman to the average citizen who witnessed a UFO and had a run-in with the MIB. One of the most famous MIB cases, which was tied directly into the Mothman sightings in Point Pleasant, West Virginia in 1966 and 1967, is discussed here, and Redfern even relates the tale of a researcher of the Loch Ness Monster and his meeting with a Man in Black. There is a chapter on the photographic evidence, which contains some photos of some strange men in (well, you know what color) who may be the bizarre agents of UFO sighting suppression or simply men wearing dark suits (how strange, especially in the ’40s and ’50s!). Men in Black reports right up until modern day are recounted, and there’s even a story of a Woman in Black.

Part 2 of Redfern’s book takes a look at the various possible explanations for who (or what) the Men in Black may really be. Hallucinations and hoaxes are explored, mainly because Albert Bender, the impetus for the MIB sightings, was not the most mentally or emotionally grounded person out there. He was prone to hallucinations and flights of fancy, and pretty much obsessed over all things UFO and occult related. Gray Barker and John Keel are suspected to have stretched the truth, filling in some blanks in order to make their stories more dramatic and interesting. And while none of these explanations rules out the possibility that these men were visited by someone, it doesn’t necessarily mean that there was a paranormal explanation for the origin of these men. That might just be a more interesting explanation. Other rational, earthly explanations include FBI agents and other civilian UFO investigative groups, who were and are known to be very territorial. Taking the evidence and “encouraging” witnesses not to talk to anyone would pretty much ensure that their group got the exclusive scoop on the sighting. The other explanations are a little more “out there,” including tulpas, time travelers and demons. The latter two are pretty self-explanatory, but tulpas, simply put, are beings theorized to be created because a person or persons believes in them strongly enough so that they actually begin to physically manifest, and when belief or interest dies down, they go away. Redfern mentions that this might be an explanation for another enigmatic entity, Bigfoot. It would explain why a body has never been found, but I personally think it’s easier to believe in an undiscovered ape than a physical manifestation of people’s thoughts.

The Good: Nick Redfern presents a thorough history of the Men in Black phenomenon, with many personal accounts, second hand stories and even some interesting (if unconvincing) photos. His writing style is thorough, witty and never boring, always leaving the reader wanting to know what is coming next. For the most part the book is, to use a tired old term, fair and balanced, presenting a number of different theories without really favoring one over the other. Many authors write books in order to push their own agendas, and I can honestly say that after reading “The Real Men in Black,” I’m still not sure what Redfern actually believes. And perhaps neither does he. As one of the few paranormal researchers out there who is proud to say “I don’t know” most of the time rather than saying “this is a ghost” or “this is proof of Bigfoot,” this is a quality I can appreciate.

The Bad: While the book is mostly fair and balanced, there are a few instances where logic should have prevailed and it didn’t. In most cases of anything paranormal or supernatural, the simplest explanation is usually the correct one. But in a few instances, Redfern seems to favor a more sensationalistic explanation over a more rational one. It only happens once or twice, and overall doesn’t really tarnish what is otherwise a pretty rational book, but it’s something that I wish was handled with a bit more ambiguity if nothing else.

The Ugly: Most of my issues with this book aren’t necessarily with the book but but with the lore as it’s been presented. Which isn’t really the author’s fault, but it does weaken the case for the MIB phenomenon and raises some serious questions. The fact that the originator of the Men in Black legend was a bit mentally unstable, and those who immediately picked it up after him in all probability hoaxed or exaggerated their own experiences really kills a lot of credibility for the existence for the MIB. While other more credible and trustworthy people have had experiences, it makes you wonder whether the MIB are real or if some higher-ups in government got wind of the silly stories and just ran with it. The truth is probably somewhere in the middle, which just muddies the waters even further.

The Bottom Line: If you’re interested in the Men in Black phenomenon and want a thorough and interesting history, then this is the book for you. Well-written, well-researched and with lots of personal accounts from investigators and civilians alike, it’s a great book to add to your library of the paranormal. Some of the theories will be hard to accept or wrap your head around fully, and some are given a little more weight than perhaps they should be, but overall “The Real Men in Black” is a great read.

Final Score: 85%

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