Ranging from the 18th century to the present and from Beacon Hill to windswept Cape Ann, Holly Nadler's collection of true ghost stories from Boston and its environs offers a varied sampling of supernatural phenomena. Many of these tales offer a satisfying dose of ghoulish and frightening details; others are colored with a certain poignancy or even humor.

“Explores the city’s ghoulish history over more than three centuries, including Colonial-era spirits.” —BU Today It should come as no surprise that one of the nation’s oldest cities brims with spirits of those who lived and died in its hundreds of years of tumultuous history. Boston, Massachusetts, boasts countless stories of the supernatural. Many students at Boston College have encountered an unearthly hound that haunts O’Connell House to this day. Be on the watch for an actor who sits in on rehearsals at Huntington Theatre and restless spirits rumored to haunt Boston Common at night. From the Victorian brownstones of Back Bay to the shores of the Boston Harbor Islands, author Sam Baltrusis makes it clear that there is hardly a corner of the Hub where the paranormal cannot be experienced—and shares terrifying tales of the long departed. Includes photos

Among Massachusetts's many treasures is Boston, a city rich in culture and history. Haunted Boston, a collection of stories of ghosts, mysteries, and paranormal happenings in Beantown, will leave readers delightfully frightened.

Ghosts lurk in the waters near Boston's historic seaport, haunting the secluded islands scattered throughout the harbor. Boston Harbor brims with the restless spirits of pirates, prisoners and victims of disease and injustice. Uncover the truth behind the Lady in Black on Georges Island. Learn about the former asylums on Long Island that inspired the movie Shutter Island, and dig up the skeletal secrets left behind by the Woman in Scarlet Robes. From items flying off the shelves at a North End cigar shop to the postmortem cries of tragedy at the centuries-old Boston Light on Little Brewster, author Sam Baltrusis breathes new life into the horrors that occurred in the historic waters surrounding Boston.

Take an eerie journey through the historic town of Boston, where ghostly friars still occupy the land of their thirteenth-century monastery, and where Sarah Preston's disembodied cries of 'Pestilence!' can sometimes be heard as her ghostly apparition jumps from the top of St Botolph's Church. Her alleged former home, Church Key Studio, has seen many occupants come and go over the centuries – but does one of them still reside there in spirit? Also featured is the ancient Guildhall of St Mary's, where a group of distinguished ghostly gentlemen hold board meetings in the upper hall while a lady apparition stares intently into the old prison cells. And explore the spectacular rooms and gardens of Fydell House, where previous occupants have been seen and heard, long after their deaths. This book tells the stories of many well-known locations, with first-hand testimonies of paranormal activity – from pubs, shops and restaurants to a former music venue. Including exclusive photographs and the results of paranormal investigations, some of the locations featured will surprise you... and some of the chilling evidence will make your blood run cold.

It's no surprise that remote Martha's Vineyard is home to a significant population of ghosts. There are the strange entities that just may have played a part in the notorious accident at the Chappaquiddick Bridge. There is the ghost of aristocratic Desire Coffin, called back from the Other Side by the power of music and the memory of lost love. And at one haunted inn, Room 8, accessible only by way of a cramped hidden staircase, is the focus of strange events—including the total disappearance of one guest. After twenty years in print, this classic is now updated and expanded with new information and new stories.

The area known as Dogtown -- an isolated colonial ruin and surrounding 3,000-acre woodland in storied seaside Gloucester, Massachusetts -- has long exerted a powerful influence over artists, writers, eccentrics, and nature lovers. But its history is also woven through with tales of witches, supernatural sightings, pirates, former slaves, drifters, and the many dogs Revolutionary War widows kept for protection and for which the area was named. In 1984, a brutal murder took place there: a mentally disturbed local outcast crushed the skull of a beloved schoolteacher as she walked in the woods. Dogtown's peculiar atmosphere -- it is strewn with giant boulders and has been compared to Stonehenge -- and eerie past deepened the pall of this horrific event that continues to haunt Gloucester even today. In alternating chapters, Elyssa East interlaces the story of this grisly murder with the strange, dark history of this wilderness ghost town and explores the possibility that certain landscapes wield their own unique power. East knew nothing of Dogtown's bizarre past when she first became interested in the area. As an art student in the early 1990s, she fell in love with the celebrated Modernist painter Marsden Hartley's stark and arresting Dogtown landscapes. She also learned that in the 1930s, Dogtown saved Hartley from a paralyzing depression. Years later, struggling in her own life, East set out to find the mysterious setting that had changed Hartley's life, hoping that she too would find solace and renewal in Dogtown's odd beauty. Instead, she discovered a landscape steeped in intrigue and a community deeply ambivalent about the place: while many residents declare their passion for this profoundly affecting landscape, others avoid it out of a sense of foreboding. Throughout this richly braided first-person narrative, East brings Dogtown's enigmatic past to life. Losses sustained during the American Revolution dealt this once thriving community its final blow. Destitute war widows and former slaves took up shelter in its decaying homes until 1839, when the last inhabitant was taken to the poorhouse. He died seven days later. Dogtown has remained abandoned ever since, but continues to occupy many people's imaginations. In addition to Marsden Hartley, it inspired a Bible-thumping millionaire who carved the region's rocks with words to live by; the innovative and influential postmodernist poet Charles Olson, who based much of his epic Maximus Poems on Dogtown; an idiosyncratic octogenarian who vigilantly patrols the land to this day; and a murderer who claimed that the spirit of the woods called out to him. In luminous, insightful prose, Dogtown takes the reader into an unforgettable place brimming with tragedy, eccentricity, and fascinating lore, and examines the idea that some places can inspire both good and evil, poetry and murder.