In the first half, Canadian author, editor, and digital publishing advocate Mark Leslie talked about his work and interest in books with paranormal themes. He made the leap from bookseller to author while on a ghost walk in Hamilton, Ontario. The experience inspired him to delve into specific places for tales of hauntings and otherworldly spirits. "A really, really good ghost story usually involved some sort of history," Leslie observed.
The topics in Leslie's books aren't limited to ghosts, however. His subjects include UFOs, cryptids, and unexplained phenomenon. Haunted objects like books and dolls are a renewed interest of his as well. Most recently, as part his latest book Macabre Montreal, Leslie explored the series of brutal experiments he says were conducted at McGill University. Dozens of patients allegedly underwent sensory deprivation, electroshocks, and doses of hallucinogenic drugs, which piqued Leslie's interest as a writer.
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In the Open Lines that followed in the latter half, Charlene in California wondered why the spirits of some deceased people returned to visit the living, while others did not. She indicated that she would like to be visited by the spirit of her best friend, who was like a sister to her. From Delaware, Jim offered his take on the differences between Jesus Christ and the Antichrist. As opposed to Jesus, who is God becoming man, the Antichrist is man making himself God, he explained. And Daniel in California described a prophetic dream, wherein he found himself in Moscow before returning to his home in Fresno to learn that the United States was under attack by Russia.
Other callers shared their own stories of haunted places and paranormal incidents. William in New Jersey shared what it was like to live in a haunted house, recalling one story when, he claimed, a ghost threw an envelope across the room. Carla, a listener in California, told of a time when she encountered a long black shadow creeping across her cousin's home, causing her to flee. Calling from New York, Steve talked about his alien abduction in 1969. "I saw grays before I knew what grays were," he said of being aboard their ship. He added that he's been visited by otherworldly beings since he was a baby.
News Segment guests: Dannion Brinkley / Kevin Randle