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Haunted Toronto

by John Robert Colombo

The problem with Haunted Toronto, John Robert Colombo’s new, and I would imagine exhaustive listing of hauntings in the Metro area, is that it hasn’t much to say that hasn’t been said before. Much of the book comprises word-for-word reprints from Colombo’s own previously published excursions into the field (Mysterious Canada and Mackenzie King’s Ghost and Other Personal Accounts of Canadian Hauntings, chief among them).

Granted, in the realm of ghost stories, a largely anthological work may be inescapable, but proper editing should ensure excerpts can stand alone. As well, Colombo’s approach of arranging his work as an encyclopedia of 66 entries, organized by geographic occasion, sees some accounts receiving short shrift. Others, by contrast, should have been excluded entirely. The Metro Police Museum, for example, not purported to be haunted, merits an entry because “it has many gruesome tales to tell.”

Colombo does include some lesser known ghost stories of the folkloric variety, which are probably seeing print for the first time. In this regard, however, as someone who, at different times has conducted regular tours and been closely associated with both Osgoode Hall and Hart House, I can say that neither of those buildings has any significant tradition of being haunted. And I’ve always been interested in ghosts. Interesting, then – and I would say convenient – that Colombo warns that guides and attendants at public buildings are less informed than they might be, and so may not be aware of the recountings in his book.

But one can’t really demand of a ghost story that it be true or even well known – only that it be interesting. And that is where Haunted Toronto, far too often, ultimately fails.

 

Reviewer: Mark Osbaldeston

Publisher:

DETAILS

Price: $18.99

Page Count: 236 pp

Format: Paper

ISBN: 0-88882-185-9

Released: Sept.

Issue Date: 1996-9

Categories: History