Books for the Urban Legends in Your Life

Gear up for a frightful jaunt into the darkest reaches of the ancient Appalachians.

Folk deep within Appalachian hollers lean close to share stories of the inexplicable with hushed awe. Monsters rumbling in the hills. Strange lights darting through the pitch-black night sky. Horrible occurrences, almost ineffable in their bizarre tragedy. "Tall tales," you might say. But tell that to the Flatwoods monster in Braxton County, West Virginia. Or the Goat Man of Louisville--look into his humanoid eyes and let him know you don't believe. And what of those apparitions in Mammoth Cave's Corpse Rock, or the Satan-spawn known as the Jersey Devil? How do you respond when those mysteries confront? From metaphysical energy that swirls near the Serpent Mound in Ohio to Point Pleasant's Mothman legacy, Mark Muncy and Kari Schultz explore the dark history lurking in the shadows of Appalachia..

In the wake of a love affair and a mysterious chain of events, Tom Dooley was convicted and hanged for the murder of Laura Foster.

At the conclusion of the Civil War, Wilkes County, North Carolina, was the site of this nationally publicized crime of passion, the nation's first. This notorious crime became an inspiration for musicians, writers and storytellers ever since, creating a mystery of mythic proportions. Through newspaper articles, trial documents and public records, Dr. John E. Fletcher brings this dramatic case to life, providing the long-awaited factual account of the legendary murder. Join the investigation into one of the country's most enduring thrillers.

Beyond the beaten path of local landmarks, residents and tourists can find curious secrets, lost mysteries and fascinating legends.

The famed Hope Diamond once found itself, and its mysterious curse, buried in an Asheville girl's sandbox. Elvis once handed a cherished guitar to a local man at an Asheville concert, and he held on to it for forty years. At a flea market, an Asheville attorney paid a few bucks for an old tintype likely of Billy the Kid, and it may be worth millions. Native author Marla Hardee Milling recounts odd, but true, stories hiding behind Asheville's picturesque beauty.

Mysterious creatures, strange happenings and ghost stories. Alabama has them all and more - despite its glorious depictions.

Alabama claims an abundance of fascinating mysteries and legends despite being known for its antebellum mansions and sunny beaches, . The White Thang is a Sasquatch-like creature that has terrorized Alabamians for generations. For a brief period in the 1980s, Needham gained national attention because of its “crying pecan tree.” In 1854, a farmer named Orion Williamson simply vanished in a field in Selma. From the aquatic beast known as the Coosa River Monster to the story of the Leprechaun of Mobile, these stories have evolved over generations. Author and ghost-story guru Alan Brown presents some of the strangest stories from this collective tradition.

A New Orleans historian and vampire expert uncovers the historic origins of the Southern city’s vampire legends from colonial days to the Great Depression.

New Orleans has a reputation as a home for creatures of the night. Popular books, movies and television shows have cemented the city's connection to vampires in the public imagination. But the stories of the Crescent City’s undead residents go much deeper than the tales of Sookie Stackhouse and The Vampire Lestat. In New Orleans Vampires, author Marita Woywod Crandle investigates the most haunting tales of vampirism in New Orleans history.

In the early days of Louisiana's colonization, rumors swirled about the fate of the Casket Girls, a group of mysterious maidens traveling to the New World from France with peculiar casket-shaped boxes. The charismatic Comte St. Germain moved to the French Quarter in the early 1900s, eerily resembling a European aristocrat of one hundred years prior bearing the same name. In the 1930s, the Carter brothers terrorized the town with their desire to feed on living human blood. Strange but true tales mix with immortal legends in this fascinating volume.

Settle in for a juicy bushel of Peach State bafflement.

Turn a metaphorical shovel of red Georgia clay to find a world teeming with inexplicable, head-scratching mystery. The legends here predate the state’s founding by hundreds of years, when Native people settled in and began grappling with the land. Now treasure hunters ply Civil War sites for the Confederacy’s lost treasure, with spectral soldiers galloping nearby. Hairy beasts lope through dark woods, while the night sky above bustles with disconcerting activity, like the UFO once spotted by Jimmy Carter. In this Georgia, psychics help convict murderers. The super-strict and thoroughly deceased former owner of Savannah’s Telfair Museum punishes rule breakers, and a ten-foot ’squatch emits a pungent stench at Minnehaha Falls. Join folklorist Alan Brown on a jaunt through the most confounding elements of Georgia’s long history.

When the sun slips behind the trees, the spirits who linger in the mountains and valleys of North Carolina’s Highlands and Cashiers whisper their stories.

Located in the Appalachian Mountains, within the Nantahala National Forest, the Highlands and Cashiers are townships rich in natural beauty and folklore. In this carefully cultivated collection, there are tales of lost loves, deals gone bad, and ghosts who walk the night. Is that a whisper winding through the hemlocks, or is it just the wind?