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Rating: 
Summary: A hotel guide with a paranormal slant
Review: It's been well established that when word slips out a hotel or restaurant is haunted, patronage rises. There might be a few people who are skittish about encountering a ghost, but the folks on the lookout for one far outnumber them. HAUNTED HOTELS should assist these people in this eclectic goal.Travel writer Robin Mead has compiled a list of over 80 known haunted hotels, motels, inns, and bed & breakfasts for a North American companion to his previous book, WEEKEND HAUNTS, which focuses on Britain. Each listing describes the facility and its amenities, local attractions, and price range, then briefly elaborates on its haunting and pertinent history. Surprisingly, the relatively youthful state of California has the most entries. It hosts some of the better-known haunted hotels, which include the Hotel del Coronado, QUEEN MARY, and Hotel Roosevelt, but more intriguing are the ones that are less familiar. The Bullock Hotel in Deadwood, South Dakota, for instance, was covered in a segment for UNSOLVED MYSTERIES several years ago, but rarely comes to mind as quickly as the aforementioned. During severe winter storms, former employee Boots Berry can still be heard tap dancing on the third floor of the Green Mountain Inn in Stowe, Vermont, even though he died almost 100 years ago. Arthemise Bouligny, one of the original owners of the Dufour-Baldwin House in New Orleans, has been seen there repeatedly on a balcony since her death in 1911. Captain Swayze, a local militia man, resents Americans after his death during the War of 1812 and tosses objects around whenever anyone who enters the Old Angel Inn in Niagra-on-the-Lake, Ontario, wearing any symbols identifying them as U.S. citizens. A couple of qualified hotels in the San Francisco Bay Area were missed in this compilation, but, in order for Mead to be that comprehensive, research would be a constant process that prevents the book from ever being released. At the end of the volume, he supplies a short list of 22 more haunted North American lodgings he knew of but was unable to personally visit. In his introduction, he also states that he deliberately withheld some known haunts because their managements asked for exclusion. Reading what life is like in these places when the folks there aren't dealing with ghostly phenomena gives the reader a better sense of place. Anyone with an interest in ghost folklore should enjoy this book regardless of whether or not a trip is being planned. Contact info is provided for those who would like to visit; however, this guide was first released in 1995 so some of it may be outdated. Whether you're looking for help to plan a supernatural vacation or just want ghost folklore, HAUNTED HOTELS can be fun on both counts. This reviewer will haunt the Internet until a copy of WEEKEND HAUNTS becomes available.
Rating:
Summary: Great for planning trips
Review: This book will help you decide where to (and not to) stay when you go on trips. The stories were well told, and enjoyable.
Rating:
Summary: Great for planning trips
Review: This book will help you decide where to (and not to) stay when you go on trips. The stories were well told, and enjoyable.
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