Do the spirits of gladiators still battle in Rome? Does a house in Spain really have ghostly faces imprinted on the floorboards? These are just two of the ghastly ghost stories from Europe that readers will learn about in this hi/lo title. Engaging text and images are sure to draw in reluctant readers, while additional features highlight a cultural connection, a possible explanation, and more!

One of the country’s most distinguished writers and publishers returns to her roots to explore the consequences of democracy in the former Habsburg lands. In 1989 the Berlin Wall was dismantled. Communism gave way to democracy. Since that time the former borderlands of the long defunct Hapsburg Empire and the more recently dispersed Soviet Empire have been trying to invent their own versions of democracy and market-driven economics. But these experiments have led to a widening gap between rich and poor. The worldwide economic crisis has severely tested Central Europe’s determination to live peaceably, and there are many disquieting signs of old hatreds and racial tensions returning. Author Anna Porter travels through the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia to speak with leading intellectuals, politicians, former dissidents and the champions of aggrieved memories. She interviews great figures of the revolution (Václav Havel, Adam Michnik, George Konrád) and its new custodians, among them Radek Sikorski and Ferenc Gyurcsány, and also examines the younger generation with little or no experience of Communism and no interest in its aftermath. She visits Poland’s Institute of National Remembrance, Prague’s Jewish Museum and Hungary’s House of Terror, each an attempt to reckon with dark episodes of history.

Ghosts of Old Europe offers a very different kind of tour to the armchair traveler. Wander through the haunted castles and cottages of Europe with Hans Holzer, the world’s most famous psychic investigator, and explore a full range of psychic phenomena from the spirits of the British Isles to the haunts of Imperial Vienna. In England, Anne Boleyn's legendary ghost walks headless within the Tower of London; a procession of transparent monks appears in the Cathedral at Winchester, where no monks have trod since the sixteenth century; and Bloody Queen Mary still visits the four-poster bed where she slept in the dark days of 1553. At Kilkea Castle in Kildare, it is said that the Wizard Earl and his companions ride at night and will return someday from the beyond to “put things right in Ireland.” Room No. 2 in the Hotel de l’Europe in Avignon holds a shocking surprise for the unwary guest; and in Paris, No. 3 avenue Montaigne offers a special concert of ghostly piano music from a spectral grand. Ghosts occur wherever a great tragedy has left an unfortunate person stranded between the next world and this one, someone who has not yet been freed from their own emotional turmoil. The true accounts presented in this book are based on Dr. Holzer's personal investigations. Should you have occasion to visit some of these special sites yourself—if you are psychically gifted (and nearly everyone is to a varying degree)—chances are you may also have a true experience, ranging from a psychic “impression” of past events to an apparition, or perhaps you will hear an unworldly sound. Meanwhile, with this volume in hand, you can read of the long-dead Black Knight of Pflindsberg galloping wildly up the mountain—from the comfort of your own home.

In this fascinating study, Schmitt examines the significance of the widespread belief in ghosts during the Middle Ages and traces the imaginative, political, and religious contexts of these everyday haunts. Ghosts were pitiful or terrifying, usually solitary, creatures who arose from their tombs to haunt their friends and relatives. Including numerous color illustrations of ghosts and their trappings, this book presents a unique and intriguing look at medieval culture. 28 color plates.

People of Europe are no stranger to ghost stories, but some terrifying tales have stood the test of time. Visit the Akershus Fortress in Norway, where a dog ghost guards the gates of the former prison. Travel to the Tower of London in England, where headless ghosts hang out. Go to the Ruthin Castle Hotel in Wales, where the ghost of the Grey Lady is said to terrify visitors. Young readers will be fascinated by each story that comes with its own set of eerie events.

This groundbreaking study considers Italian Romanticism and the modern myth of Italy. Ranging across European and international borders, he examines the metaphors, facts, and fictions about Italy that were born in the Romantic age and continue to haunt the global literary imagination.

"Travel around the globe to uncover some of the world's most terrifyingly haunted places. With eerie images and lots of bone-chilling information, you won't want this spine-tingling world tour to end!"-- Back cover.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning look at the collapse of Communism in Eastern Europe

Europe is a land full of mystery and spooky stories. These are some of the most haunted and macabre locations and the stories behind them. Spanning the continent from England to Romania. There are over 40 black and white photos (to save printing costs) of the various locations! Haunted Places of Europe is also a travel guide of sorts. I describe how you can get to almost all of these locations. Come explore the mysteries and use the travel information to eventually go see these incredible places for yourself! Haunted Places of Europe features locations that are besieged by vampires, serial killers, ruthless tyrants, execution sites, ghosts, a church decorated with human remains, the portal to hell and even a cursed monastery. You will learn some history while feeling a chill in your spine. Turn off the lights, sit back and enjoy the tales behind some of the most Haunted Places of Europe!

Haunted Europe offers the first comprehensive account of the British and Irish fascination with a Gothic vision of continental Europe, tracing its effect on British intellectual life from the birth of the Gothic novel, to the eve of Brexit, and the symbolic recalibration of the UK's relationship to mainland Europe. By focusing on the development of the relationship between Britain and Ireland and continental Europe over more than two-hundred years, this collection marks an important departure from standard literary critical narratives, which have tended to focus on a narrow time-period and have missed continuities and discontinuities in our ongoing relationship with the mainland.