Varla Ventura, fan favorite on Huffington Post’s Weird News, frequent guest on Coast to Coast, and bestselling author of The Book of the Bizarre and Beyond Bizarre, introduces a new Weiser Books Collection of forgotten crypto-classics. Magical Creatures is a hair-raising herd of affordable digital editions, curated with Varla’s affectionate and unerring eye for the fantastic. Perhaps one of the most notorious creatures from the fairy realm is the ever-changing trickster fairy: the Pooka. A shapeshifter, the pooka can take many forms, including invisibility, although it most often appears as a terrible horse with eyes of fire and flaming breath. It can also appear as a goat, goblin, dog, or even a rabbit. Not inherently evil, their main task is taunting: they'll take you on a joyride of terrifying proportions, shake you out of your current frame of mind, knock you out of your stupor with a swift kick. Taming the Pooka includes tales of this monster's mayhem--from such notables as W. B. Yeats and T. Crofton Croker, as well as Douglas Hyde. No one is beyond the cunning of the pooka!

Varla Ventura, fan favorite on Huffington Post’s Weird News, frequent guest on Coast to Coast, and bestselling author of The Book of the Bizarre and Beyond Bizarre, introduces a new Weiser Books Collection of forgotten crypto-classics. Magical Creatures is a hair-raising herd of affordable digital editions, curated with Varla’s affectionate and unerring eye for the fantastic. Perhaps the most feared creature in Irish fairy lore, the Banshee is the ghostly, female apparition whose shriek portents the demise of a loved one. Elliot O'Donnell explores the terrifying Banshee-equivalents of cultures around the world-- from the Highland Castles of Scotland to the seaside villages of Italy-- and his tales of these creatures make the Irish Banshee look like nothing more than a cherubic Christmas-caroler.

Varla Ventura, fan favorite on Huffington Post’s Weird News, frequent guest on Coast to Coast, and bestselling author of The Book of the Bizarre and Beyond Bizarre, introduces a new Weiser Books Collection of forgotten crypto-classics. Magical Creatures is a hair-raising herd of affordable digital editions, curated with Varla’s affectionate and unerring eye for the fantastic. Theophile Gautier's gothic tale of a man's magical adventures when he serendipitously walks into a Parisian curiosity shoppe to purchase a bauble, and becomes owner of a 3,000 year-old ancient Egyptian princess' mummified foot.

Varla Ventura, fan favorite on Huffington Post’s Weird News, frequent guest on Coast to Coast, and bestselling author of The Book of the Bizarre and Beyond Bizarre, introduces a new Weiser Books Collection of forgotten crypto-classics. Magical Creatures is a hair-raising herd of affordable digital editions, curated with Varla’s affectionate and unerring eye for the fantastic. We are all werewolves. Or at least, according to supernatural expert Sabine Baring-Gould, we are all capable of becoming werewolves. Written in 1868, this selection from Baring-Gould's massive tome on werewolves will have you locking the doors and looking over your shoulder. Into the mirror.

Varla Ventura, fan favorite on Huffington Post’s Weird News, frequent guest on Coast to Coast, and bestselling author of The Book of the Bizarre and Beyond Bizarre, introduces a new Weiser Books Collection of forgotten crypto-classics. Magical Creatures is a hair-raising herd of affordable digital editions, curated with Varla’s affectionate and unerring eye for the fantastic. Bram Stoker, the master of horror and dark mind behind the most famous vampire novel in history—Dracula—brings us to the edge of our chairs again with a tale of a different variety. Here the horrors are not vampires, nor are they werewolves. Here the horrors are poverty and vicious, snarling rats. A young man finds himself (foolishly) wandering beyond the city walls of 1850s Paris, making his way into the dust piles and garbage gatherings of the paupers. Living among the rags and the war-torn are giant, beady eyed rats. Hideous beasts that clean a dead (or dying) human body down to its skeleton before the flesh is even cold. Add to that a swampy quagmire and some curious psychic insights, and you have a masterful tale of the macabre that is not for the feint of heart.

Varla Ventura, fan favorite on Huffington Post’s Weird News, frequent guest on Coast to Coast, and bestselling author of The Book of the Bizarre and Beyond Bizarre, introduces a new Weiser Books Collection of forgotten crypto-classics. Magical Creatures is a hair-raising herd of affordable digital editions, curated with Varla’s affectionate and unerring eye for the fantastic. Don't walk into that churchyard or a schoolhouse without a hardhat! There are more than just the usual hazards of daily life in rural Wales that could bring you harm. There are murderous bells afoot!

Varla Ventura, fan favorite on Huffington Post’s Weird News, frequent guest on Coast to Coast, and bestselling author of The Book of the Bizarre and Beyond Bizarre, introduces a new Weiser Books Collection of forgotten crypto-classics. Magical Creatures is a hair-raising herd of affordable digital editions, curated with Varla’s affectionate and unerring eye for the fantastic. Beware the Scandinavian Christmas Troll! They love to dance and drink through the night on Christmas Eve. If you are in Bavaria, take heed of the Berchte--a wretched bogey who cuts the stomachs open of naughty children. In this wonderful collection of folkloric traditions from early 20th century author Clement A. Miles you will find werewolves, devils, goblins, curses, hexes, and rituals of the dead, all as they relate to Yuletide celebrations around the world.

Varla Ventura, fan favorite on Huffington Post’s Weird News, frequent guest on Coast to Coast, and bestselling author of The Book of the Bizarre and Beyond Bizarre, introduces a new Weiser Books Collection of forgotten crypto-classics. Magical Creatures is a hair-raising herd of affordable digital editions, curated with Varla’s affectionate and unerring eye for the fantastic. Séances, haunted houses, an evil tailor, Dogs from Hell, demons, goblins, wraiths…all are creeping about within these pages, as they once freely lurked through the hills of Wales. 19th century author Wirt Sikes documented the stories and encounters with these beings from the Other Realm while serving serving as the U.S. Ambassador to Wales and the result is a delightful collection of the unseen from impish hauntings and invisible trickery to full-scale possession and child-stealing. Arm yourself with these stories that you might better be prepared when you encounter those things that go bump in the night!

Presents an illustrated A to Z reference containing over 1,000 entries providing information on Celtic myths, fables and legends from Ireland, Scotland, Celtic Britain, Wales, Brittany, central France, and Galicia.

"Here there be dragons"--this notation was often made on ancient maps to indicate the edges of the known world and what lay beyond. Heroes who ventured there were only as great as the beasts they encountered. This encyclopedia contains more than 2,200 monsters of myth and folklore, who both made life difficult for humans and fought by their side. Entries describe the appearance, behavior, and cultural origin of mythic creatures well-known and obscure, collected from traditions around the world.