In TOOBR (“The Obscure Occult Book Report”) the departure point for each episode is an occult-themed book so obscure that not only is it our hope you’ve never read it, but that you’ve never even heard of it, and you never would’ve, if you hadn’t decided to tune in and listen.
- A longing for transcendence with a certain style
John Foxx, The Quiet Man: Short Stories by John Foxx (London: Rocket 88 Books, 2020).
A collection of fictional writings that break the traditional rules of storytelling leads us into a consideration of how writing might be used for magical purposes. - Suddenly psychosis isn’t so psychotic
Elizabeth E. Mintz, The Psychic Thread: Paranormal and Transpersonal Aspects of Psychotherapy (New York: Human Sciences Press, 1983).
We consider in detail some intriguing and sometimes startling true cases, exploring a text that offers frank and practical guidance to psychotherapists on how they should respond when paranormal forms of communication occur within therapy. - Glimmers from the matrix of ideas
Peter Dickinson, Chance, Luck & Destiny (London: Victor Gollancz, 1975).
The seeds of chaos magick, uncovered in the unlikely context of a 1975 children’s book on chance and probability. We take a nostalgic romp through some of the fascinations and shortcomings of a scientistic take on magick, which seems to have formed a significant current in the 70s zeitgeist. - Ghosts haunt places but poltergeists people
Nandor Fodor, On the Trail of the Poltergeist (New York, NY: Citadel, 1958).
A possibly much underrated poltergeist case, from 1938, is our springboard into issues concerning how a psychoanalytical approach to paranormal investigation radically recontextualises the notion of “faked” versus “genuine” psychical phenomena. - Disembodied voices trying to hypnotize
Terence Palmer, The Science of Spirit Possession, second edition (Newcastle, UK: Cambridge Scholars).
Can discarnate entities take possession of human beings? We consider an academic text that attempts to build a serious case by drawing on the work of Frederic Myers and considering evidence offered by the nature of dissociative states and hypnosis. - A microcosm in no sense separated from reality
Anatole France, “Aristos and Polyphilos on the Language of Metaphysics”, in The Garden of Epicurus, translated by Alfred Allinson (London: John Lane, 1908).
A search for an intriguing-sounding text, prompted by a half-remembered reference in a letter by Aleister Crowley, leads us into an exploration of how language facilitates expression of what lies beyond sensory perception. - Subjectivity is only a body that hasn’t yet formed
Robert Harry Hover, Internal Moving Healing – Manual of Instruction: Stopping Your Pain & Other Unpleasant Things (Bloomington, IN: AuthorHouse, 2004).
A book by a meditation master and former NASA engineer, who presents a mental technique for alleviating all forms of physical and emotional pain. We describe and explore his method, its origins, and confront the question of how it could possibly work, if, as its author insists, it’s a mental technique that involves neither imagination nor visualisation. - Salvation is not an evidence-based intervention
David Stokes, The Human Experiment (no date, publisher, or location specified. ISBN 9781521944493).
A memoir of a mental health support worker who works with clients in the most deprived areas of London. We consider the issues arising from its author’s attempts to redress the repressive shortcomings of the UK mental health system by resisting consensus models and incorporating into his daily duties elements of magick and spirituality. - The problem with the damned is that they tend to stick around
Angel Rae, Into the Darkness: Conversations with the Dead (Fort Wayne, IN: Dark Moon Press, 2017).
Exploring the dynamics of communicating with the dead in the context of paranormal investigation, focusing particularly on issues around judgment and identity, and how these challenge or contradict mainstream assumptions.
Occult Experiments in the Home 