I have been, for some reason, dragging my feet on reading new books until I comment on the ones I've read most recently for reasons that are likely irrational. I'm working through my reviews of my paranormal mini-tour and discovered tonight to my delight that I had actually written a passable commentary on Science and the Afterlife Experience by Chris Carter shortly after I read it. I think I am settling on a new format for non-fiction reviews, but this will do for now in the interests of moving forward. I'm not entirely certain it's vital I give a New York Review of Books worthy discussion of a book on the paranormal on this blog that I'm pretty sure only I read anyway. I do want to write a bit about being interested in the paranormal in our age of science and religion but I guess that's coming after.
I think maybe, though, I didn't do an awesome job of covering the focus of the book which is carefully compiled reports of the most credible experiences across three broad groups: reincarnation, apparitions and mediumship. All three sections are incredibly interesting, and it's a good overview of the kind of experiences that people report as evidence for all three topics. Even the mediumship section, a field which has historically been filled with charlatans, introduced a new facet I had never heard of, which are the cross-correspondences, the supposed attempts of departed souls attempting to pass coded messages back through multiple mediums in order to establish some sort of confidence in their authenticity. You may or may not be convinced by that, but I thought the idea was clever and fun.
If you're at all interested in a fair assessment of experiential reports of the paranormal, you can't do much better than Chris Carter and Science and the Afterlife Experience.
