Tag Archives: event

In which the Author embarks on a Halloween tour of Scotland…

From 26th October to the 12th November I’m back in Scotland for a ‘Halloween tour‘ of lectures, talks and events. I’ll have books on sale at each event.

1. SATURDAY & SUNDAY 26TH & 27TH OCTOBER, SCONE PALACE, PERTH.

TALK: ‘THE BODYSNATCHERS OF SCONE (plus the puma, the witch and the severed head)’

Join Geoff as he delves into the dark world of the Resurrectionists, the strange collaboration of hardened criminals and respectable medical men who broke into coffins and stole bodies for the dissecting tables of the anatomists.

Bodysnatching ahoy!

Time: 1pm

Tickets: £10 (include grounds admission) – 01738 552300 or  visits@scone-palace.co.uk or  www.scone-palace.co.uk

SPECIAL: On the Saturday the talk (and the subsequent visit to the Palace graveyard) will be filmed by TF1 (the

French equivalent of BBC1) for a ‘Halloween in Scotland’ special to be broadcast in France on 2 November. Come

along and be on television!

 

2. THURSDAY 31ST OCTOBER – SKEPTICS IN THE PUB, EDINBURGH.

TALK: ‘SCOTTISH WITCHCRAFT’

Scottish witchcraft has by now developed its own mythology, a set of ideas that ‘everybody knows’. Geoff’s talk

will attempt to separate fantasy from historical reality, which is both stranger and more sordid than most people

suspect. By way of illustration he will detail his own groundbreaking investigations into the famous Maggie Wall

Witchcraft Monument in Perthshire, a B-listed historical monument (and favourite trysting spot for the Moors

Murderers) that, as the painted inscription states, supposedly commemorates “Maggie Wall burned here as a

Witch 1657”. The key word, boys and girls, is “supposedly”.

Venue: The Banshee Labyrinth
 29-35 Niddry Street
 Edinburgh 
EH1 1LG

Time: 7.30PM

Free – More details at http://edinburgh.skepticsinthepub.org/Event.aspx/1768/Witches-in-Scotland

3. SATURDAY 9TH NOVEMBER, GLASGOW – SCOTTISH SOCIETY OF PSYCHICAL RESEARCH ANNUAL

CONFERENCE.

TALK: ‘SEX, LIES AND PARANORMAL GLASGOW’

Venue: Hilton Glasgow Grosvener Hotel, 
Grosvener Terrace, Great Western Road / Byres Road, Glasgow

Time: from 10 am to 4.40 pm

Tickets: £35: http://www.sspr.co.uk/index.html

 

4. TUESDAY 12TH NOVEMBER: THE EDINBURGH FORTEAN SOCIETY.

TALK: ‘ZOMBIES FROM HISTORY’

Zombie culture didn’t start with George Romero. Here be medieval chroniclers’ sworn-to-be-true tales of the

plague-spreading undead; the pugilistic zombie of Paisley; archeological evidence of Anglo-Saxon and Romano-

British fear of the walking dead; several ‘Ladies with the Ring’, all supposedly revived in the grave by jewel-stealing

gravediggers; the man who was hanged and buried – and then revived; the Cumbrian Crusader whose corpse was still bleeding 800 years after his death; and the bog body that solved a modern murder mystery.

Warning: contains corpses. 

Venue: The Counting House, 38 West Nicolson Street, Edinburgh EH8 9DD

Time: 7.30pm

Cost: £1 – http://www.edinburghforteansociety.org.uk/index.html

Poltergeist Over ScotlandParanormal Perthshire11 - Maggie Wall monumentzombies cover for blog

Paranormal GlasgowScottish Bodysnatchers - A Gazetteer

In which the author gives a talk on ghosts in St Andrews…

 

On Thursday 23rd February I’ll be in the St Andrews Public Library giving an illustrated talk on ghosts.

 

Entitled ‘Haunted St Andrews and Area,’ and based on the book of the same name, the talk will feature such supernatural denizens as:

The White Lady and The Haunted Tower

 

  • The Poltergeist of Pitmilly House (and other poltergeists)
  • Ghosts of The Pends and St Leonard’s School
  • Ghosts of Town and Gown
  • Death Warnings and a Vortex of Evil

 

The event starts at 7.30pm and tickets (which are selling fast) are £3.50. Call 01334 659378.

Location: St Andrews Library, Church Square (off Church Street, between South Street and Market Street), St Andrews, KY16 9NN. More details and map here.

 
 

In which the author has a play at the Playwrights’ Studio ‘Stage to Page’ workshop…

On Monday 30 January one of my plays, ‘I Walked With A Zombie,’ will be workshopped at the ‘Stage to Page’ event in premier Glasgow venue The Arches.

 

‘I Walked With A Zombie’ centres around a group of art students making a short film in homage to classic zombie movies such as Night of the Living Dead and Dawn of the Dead. But during the filming, all the participants are visited by their own personal zombies…

 

‘Stage to Page’ describes itself as “A chance for writers, actors and directors to collaborate by workshopping scenes from a new work together.” Each month, a guest director chooses scenes from an unperformed play, and actors turn up, are randomly allocated roles, and then collaborate in workshopping the scenes before performing them to everyone present.

 

The event is at The Arches, 253 Argyle Street, Glasgow G2 8DL (under Central Station). It starts at 7pm on Monday 30th and entrance for all is £3, which includes a drink (you can just turn up to observe the proceedings without participating, and many people do just that, to watch the creative process in action).

 

More info at www.thearches.co.uk/events/arts/stage-to-page. Stage to Page is an initiative of the Playwrights’ Studio, www.playwrightsstudio.co.uk/stagetopage.htm.

 

If you come along, I’ll be the zombie-like individual wearing the idiot grin.

In which the author launches Haunted Dundee with a signing at Waterstones…

 

My next book, Haunted Dundee, is published on 26th January. So, manic grin in place, I’ll be signing copies that day in the Dundee Waterstones branch.

 

The book explores several centuries of Dundonian hauntings. There are stories of poltergeists, malevolent entities, apparitions, strange sounds, doppelgangers, visionary experiences and much more. The incidents range from 1706 to the present day, and include the tales of the White Ladies of Coffin Mill and Balgay Bridge, the hauntings of the historic ships Discovery and Unicorn, and a host of personal ghost sightings told to me by contemporary eye-witnesses.

 

Other cases include some truly bizarre episodes of apparent hallucinations of ghostly individuals investigated by a distinguished psychiatrist who was also a member of the Society of Psychical Research.

 

To celebrate, I’ll be signing copies on Thursday 26th January at the Waterstones branch at 35 Commercial Street, Dundee. Map here!

 

 

I’ll be in store between 1 and 2.30 p.m. Ish. If you can’t make it at the time, you could always call the shop on 0843 290 8287 and ask them to reserve a copy, which I’ll sign for you to pick up later. (They’ll probably have copies of Paranormal Dundee for sale as well.)

 

Watch the trailer for Haunted Dundee now!

 

In which the author gives a talk on poltergeists at Kinross…

On Monday 21st December I’m delighted to be the guest of the Kinross-shire Historical Society. Topics for the evening will include local big cat sightings, a particularly dastardly bodysnatching crime involving a hidden door and a secret underground dissection chamber, and an eighteenth century poltergeist that specialised in the relocation of pins inside slices of meat and boiled eggs. Just the usual stuff, then.

 

Everyone is welcome. The event kicks off at 7.30 in the parish church on Station Road, and as usual I’ll have copies of books for sale and signing.

In which the author goes back to prison with some vampires…

I’ve just been booked for another author’s visit to one of Her Majesty’s Prisons. This will be my fourth talk behind bars – and this time, by request, I’m doing it on vampires, which is a popular subject with the inmates of this particular prison.

 

So the Vampire with Iron Teeth (from Paranormal Glasgow) will be featuring, as well as the Vampire of Croglin Grange (from Paranormal Cumbria, which will be out in 2012) and an alleged vampiric attack in Highland Perthshire, which I covered in The Guide to Mysterious Perthshire.

 

I’ll also be dealing a little bit with the early history of vampires in English literature, noting how the vampire of East European folklore – basically a stupid, smelly peasant – became the suave, sophisticated aristocrat familiar from Dracula and similar fictions. I blame John Polidori (and if you say who? I would in normal circumstances suggest that you attend the talk; but as this would involve committing a serious crime and then getting banged up in the Big House, perhaps this is not a recommended course of action).

 

As you might imagine, you can’t just waltz into a prison. Checks are made, paperwork is processed, and the prisoners themselves have to be available on the day and time specified. Then you find yourself leaving your mobile with a reception guard and being escorted through a labyrinth of doors and corridors to a room in which sit 25 prisoners, many of whom are avid readers. Usually the prison librarian has circulated my books before the visit, and so as soon as I say “Any questions?” at the end there is a forest of raised hands.

 

I’ve enjoyed every prison talk I’ve given, one of which brought up one of the strangest personal encounters I’ve ever been told by an audience member.  Usually people describe their experiences of seeing a UFO or a ghost – but this particular prisoner told me that, driving fast on a road in Fife one night, he passed a figure complete with scythe, black cloak and skull face – Death himself…