BOOO! Er, I mean BRRRR!!!
Or do I?
Happy Holidays! Today I'm giving away a hardcover copy of Classic Ghost Stories: Spooky Tales to Read at Christmas to one randomly selected lucky reader. (The book will not be available until after Christmas though, just so you know.)
I don't know about you, but I especially love spooky stories and vintage mysteries around the holidays. There's something peculiarly delightful about that weird blend of cozy and creepy.
To be eligible for this giveaway, share a real life spooky experience with us in the comment section below. It doesn't necessarily have to be your own experience, but you have to have got the story by word-of-mouth. And if it's a eerie story from around the holidays, even better!!!
And in the spirit of sharing spooky stories, here's a link to a three public domain ghost stories which you can read for free. A little something different for you coffee break (just don't walk home from work alone!) ;-)
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Thank you all for sharing your own intriguing ghostly encounters! Those were really entertaining (and possibly good material for a story or two).
The randomly selected winner of a copy of Classic Ghost Stories: Spooky Tales to Read at Christmas is David Warner!
Congratulations, David!
We took a ghost tour in North Carolina. We were at a cemetery when all of sudden some fog rolled in, but it was strange fog. It centered over one grave which was of a little girl who was murdered in the 1800s.
ReplyDeleteChristmas time is ABSOLUTELY the best time for ghost stories. Love me a bit of M R James this time of year. I love ghosts and ghost stories, though have no spooky stories of my own :( A good friend of mine lived in a very peculiar house when he first left home, however. The housemates often heard voices, footsteps and doors opening & closing when they knew they were the only ones in. Also, once, there was an occasion when his bed physically lifted off the floor with him and someone else in it. SUPER spooky O_O
ReplyDeleteThe book sounds both spooky and awesome!
ReplyDeleteSo...it was the day before yesterday or so, with the super moon glowing brightly, the huge halo obscured occasionally by wispy clouds. I kept glimpsing it over houses and through tree branches, each time different and awesome. I was walking along a quiet street, and looking up I saw this weird shape on a roof, looking like a sort of ghostly, creepy, squatting Batman. It totally freaked me out. It was probably just the chimney. That's it. :-)
KC
My mother, as they say, could communicate with those passed on, as could her mother. There are great family stories of my mom confronting her recently passed uncle to find where he had left his keys. But this is a holiday story. My mother became ill around Thanksgiving. She went to bed and did not really get up after. She was 45yrs old. I was 10. The priest came to give last rights just before the holidays. Christmas Eve she lapsed into coma and an ambulance was called. Just as they were leaving, my grandmother arrived. Since we lived out in the country, she had taken a taxi for miles. My father asked her how she knew to come. My mother had called her, my grandmother said. My father said that was impossible. She never left her bed. My grandmother said, “Ah, that’s why there was no dial tone.”
ReplyDeleteWhen I was in elementary school in Waukesha, WI, I played hide n seek with my four siblings and the lights turned off in the house (my parents weren't home).
ReplyDeleteAs my brother counted to 100, I followed my youngest sis down the hallway to my parents bedroom. I followed her in the closet. We spent the next 30 seconds or so giggling and poking one another in the ribs.
When we all met back in the living room after the game was over, I saw my little sister I followed in closet already in the living room with my other three siblings.
If she wasn't the one giggling and poking me in the closet, who was?
My grandmother (my father's mother) died the summer that I was about 6 years old. On Christmas Eve, later that same year, as the family sat around the living room after dinner--admiring the tree before opening our gifts--my parents were talking about how much they missed my grandmother, because Christmas had always been her favorite time of year. Moments later, my mother, who was now every shade of pale, said to my father, "Did you hear that?" My Dad said, "Yes. It sounded just like Mom." Of course, when I asked them about it, they said that it was nothing and that I should just forget it. I tried, but the memory stuck with me. Years later, when I was home from college for the holidays, I asked my mother again about that incident. She told me what they wouldn't tell me all those years ago. The voice from the other room said, "I'm still here." Later that night, as I was drifting off to sleep in my old bedroom, I thought I heard the words "I'm still here" echo in the room. It could have been my imagination somewhere between consciousness and sleep, but I choose to believe the alternative--that my grandmother is still out there, watching over us.
ReplyDeleteMy mother had a lot of paranormal experiences when I was still a kid. There was once when she was in the bathroom in our old house (a bathroom that had no door attached to it, only shower curtains) & she wondered why I kept pacing back & forth outside of the said bathroom. Only to realize later, that...I was outside our house the whole time. Then, one time when she was about to shower, she saw a kid sitting on the ground in the same bathroom. I think it was the same kid pacing outside of it. (This story terrified me very much as my mom refused to tell me about her paranormal encounters. I just learned about it because I overheard them discussing about it in a different native dialect, which unbeknowst to her at the time, I was quickly learning to understand.) I also remember this one time when my aunt (on my mom side) paid us a visit & she told us that she saw my dad ascending the stairs & she only got a glimpse of his legs wearing a baggy short (which practically told her that it was my dad.) Only to found out later that my dad was in the work at that time. Doppelganger, I guess.
ReplyDeleteMy Great Aunt was a character, around one Christmas time her nephews were visiting and she told them that the back door was locked and her husband had the key. She asked them to take the empty coal bucket around to the back of the house using the front door, go to the coal house, fill the bucket and bring it back. They agreed and as soon as they had left the room she ran out of the back door which wasn’t locked went into the coal house, put a sheet over her head and waited. There was some washing of underpants to do later. They did get her back but it’s too rude to relate.
ReplyDeleteGhost stories... I have several ;)
ReplyDeleteWhen I was five I woke up in the middle of the night and saw a blue glowing figure rummaging around me room. I grabbed my cat, that was sleeping on my bed, and hid under the covers until morning.
When I was 19 I was driving home and saw my mom dressed in her favorite comfy clothes standing by the road waving at me.
The shed in the house I grew up in, neither my sister or I would ever go there after dark. Very creepy vibes and the feeling of being watched.
When I was in my early 20's I shared a place with my bff from high school. I woke up with her standing by my bed with a baseball bat. She was totally scared of her room. So I said we'll pull out the sofa bed, sleep there and I will protect you from the big bad. As I was drifting off, she's what I figure to be tossing and turning. I hear her whimpering and look over and her side is being shaken. After a round of WTF it stopped. I should also note that my one cat would howl and claw at one specific spot on her wall.
I saw a redcoat walking down the road one night.
What ever is in my house now gets pissy at times and I wake up gasping for breath and with bruises on my shoulders. :)
--Andy Slayde
Have a couple of dreams and incidents that were eerie to me at least ... One spooky story I have is from our new (at the time house). A couple of years after we moved in , one summertime evening the windows are open to let the night air in . You can hear the cicadas going full blast but their noise has become so familiar by that time that is just another sound of the night. It was one of the nights where your brain knows you're tired but it just can't shut off. My pastime for these nights is making up stories with me as the protagonist - of course! While I'm being wooed by my imaginary lover I hear a baby's cry coming from outside. At the beginning I thought it's my youngest nephew that have "escaped " sleep time again - it takes me a few seconds to remember we don't have a newborn or a toddler at the house anymore. I don't hear the sound again ,so i think nothing of it and I lie down again. This happens three more times and by the fourth I was so paranoid that it was something outside that i stayed with my phone on to record the sound so I can upload to the net and check what it was. It seemed i ran out of luck as i never heard the sound again and of course no one heard anything in the morning.
ReplyDeleteIn the other story, I was sound asleep when I suddenly felt a heavy weight in my chest. In my dreams I was seeing shadows of children sitting on top of me being all happy while I was struggling when suddenly a black veiled lady came and seeing the opportunity she started struggling me. IN situations like these I'm usually aware it's a nightmare and I usually wake up. That was the first time in my life I Felt I couldn't wake up. I started panicking so much I couldn't remember the words for our heavenly father , which i recite when scared. I had to say it four times in order for me to say it correctly and that was when I felt the weight lifted and I could open my eyes.
While on the phone next day with my BFF -as per morning ritual - I tell her all of my wacky dreams. Upon hearing it she told me I was really lucky as she was told that this lady truly exist as a lore in Greece and that she has hurt other people.
I went to this haunted palace in Madrid, Palacio de Linares, it is very well known because many scary things happened there, and there have been plenty of sightings of supernatural nature. I do not know if it was my mind or if it was real, but I had a really bad feeling all the time I spent there, it was not only the cold, I felt I was not wanted there... I never ever want to come back there...
ReplyDeleteMy aunt and uncle had a ghost. They'd often see a female figure watching from their upstairs bedroom window when arriving or leaving, but no one was ever found in the house. It was confined, as far as they knew, to that room. A made bed would be found unmade, and vice versa, and small objects moved around on dressers. My aunt and uncle were salt of the earth Midwestern horse ranchers, and raised and showed Wiemaraners, and were not much given to flights of fancy. They took it all in stride, but as a child and young teenager I was freaked by these events, and hated when we'd visit overnight, as my sister and I would sleep in their room, and they'd take the pullout couch. I only every personally witnessed the made/unmade bed, and I can't be 100% sure they didn't do it that time because they knew how nervous it made me, lol.
ReplyDeleteMy friend was walking through the old town main street with a group of friends. She fell behind after she spotted what looked like a flashlight bouncing in an antique store that was already closed. When she leaned in to peer through the glass, there was no light to be found, but as her breath fogged up the glass, a hand print showed up on the glass. She ran then to catch up to her friends and she later learned that the store was one that is purportedly haunted.
ReplyDeleteExcuse for my bad grammar, English is not my first language:)
ReplyDeleteI was in 2nd grade at that time and I still remember everything I dreamed that night. My dream starts with me, my brother and our private tutor are having lessons at 8.pm. The light suddenly goes out and we decide to wait outside the balcony since it's too dark in the room. The doorbell rang and it's 12.am!? Our tutor left then our neighbor came over and tell us to hide since ''the ghost'' is coming. My grandfather quickly put me under the dining table but he doesn't have enough time to hide. I watch the images of legs walking by and grabbing my family members. It's a horrible nightmare and I woke up drenched in sweats.
Few days later, it's the day when me and my brother have our lessons with out private tutor again. Everything is fine until the light goes off. I'm so nervous, my heart is literally jumping so hard that I can feel it in my throat. I glance over the clock and it is 8 pm exactly like my dream. Heck, our tutor even suggest we go outside the balcony to wait. This is not a dream, it's reality. Well, fortunately, the light goes on and my uncle tells us that was the electricity error.
It's more than 10 years already yet I still remember every single thing that happened. No real ghosts was seen or real horror occurred. It's just weird...
My experience circa 1993, Christmas time. I used to be a Letter Carrier and one of my elderly customers passed away a weekend or two around Christmas. He used to sit on his stoop and wait for me to get to the top of the hill to his place. We'd talk and he'd tell me about the neighborhood of old as he'd owned the corner store down the street for more than 40 years. Anyway, one morning as I approached his house I got a rush of something, then I could smell him and feel him. I hadn't seen him or the Mrs. for a couple of weeks and wondered where they were. I just stood there a minute 'till the sensation passed. Later that day when I got back to the office in a stack of mail waiting for me I received his previous Social Security check back and the Mrs. had written DECEASED on the front and signed her name.
ReplyDelete