The Enduring Appeal of the New York City Ghost Tour June 13, 2013 There are many, many guides who will show you the best, brightest, and most beautiful sights the city has to offer, but I prefer the darker side of tourism. I want to know about the hidden histories of those who never made it into the guidebooks. I want to know what happened in the darkest nights, in the furthest reaches of New York City’s past. I want to know what happened to this city’s poor, to its wretches, to its forgotten. Most of all, I want to know what happened to its ghosts.
Nethermead May 9, 2013 Fairly recently, one of my short stories, Nethermead, was made into a film by Soren Bailey. The story concerns a young woman bored by her job, her life, and everything, who is finally driven to madness when she rambles through the eponymous meadow in Prospect Park one shady twilit evening… NETHERMEAD TRAILER from Soren Bailey […]
Ghosts of the Sea April 11, 2013 The ocean is filled with wrecks and the bodies of doomed sailors and passengers. With so many ghosts of the sea, the earth’s waters should be one of the most haunted places in existence.
Green-Wood Cemetery Tour on April 7th! March 28, 2013 Cool! The South Slope News just called my Green-Wood tour “brilliant!” Truthfully, 50% of this brilliance comes from the fact that the $20 fee includes a burger and beer from the Sea Witch Tavern! There is a tour-only option available for those who don’t wish the burger and beer, at $10. I’ll be leading a […]
Brooklyn Ghosts: Cobble Hill March 22, 2013 Found this great post over at the Bowery Boys, telling a Brooklyn ghost story I’d never heard before. And it’s thoroughly awesome. According to Henry Reed Stiles’ 1869 history of Brooklyn, the following event transpired one night in the 1820s, in a rowdy little tavern on Red Hook Lane: “One evening at around 11 p.m., […]
New Look, Plus Twitter! March 1, 2013 After months of playing with this website, and with the overall concept of Boroughs of the Dead, I’ve finally figured a few things out. First, and most obviously, I’ve updated the look of the site. The present theme has a pleasantly old-fashioned look, one wonderfully reminiscent of Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s The Yellow Wallpaper. Second, I’ve […]
The Tragic Romance of Charlotte Canda January 28, 2013 The story of Charlotte Canda isn’t technically a ghost story, but it’s an eerie tale of love and death in Victorian New York, which makes it the perfect thing for the upcoming weeks — for those who like their Valentine’s Day with a Gothic twist, that is. Charlotte Canda was a Victorian-era debutante who lived […]
Poe Tour This Weekend January 18, 2013 Join me this Saturday January 19th to celebrate Edgar Allan Poe’s 204th “birthday” with a walking tour of Greenwich Village. I’m running two tours, one at 2:30pm and one at 7:30pm. Tours are 90 minutes long, and you can buy tickets here. Poe belongs to New York. He was a literatus, not a loner, and […]
Poe in New York City, 1837 – 1838 (Pt. 2) January 10, 2013 This is the second half of a guest post written by Lisa Lideks, who runs the blog The World of Edgar Allan Poe. An authority on Poe who is devoted to separating truth and fiction, Ms. Lideks gives us the lowdown on some of his lesser-known years in Gotham. Last we heard, he was living […]