Haunted New Jersey: Ghosts and Strange Phenomena of the Garden State

As Martinelli and Stansfield reveal, New Jersey is home to dozens of unexplained phenomena, from the legendary Jersey Devil to the lesser-known White Stag of Shamong. The authors (Martinelli is a freelance writer; Stansfield is a geography professor at Rowan University in New Jersey) take a serious look at the state's occult history, traversing it from northwest mountains to the southern beaches as they document reported sightings of ghosts, witches and other creatures. Befitting their credentials and generally sober tone, the authors don't actually reveal whether or not they believe in certain legends. Rather, they rely on eyewitness accounts to verify their tellings. For example,""several people have seen"" a dead baron strolling the grounds of a Ringwood reservoir, and""local residents have reported seeing the ghost"" of a Revolutionary War casualty in Elizabeth. Not as playful as last year's Weird N.J.: Your Travel Guide to New Jersey's Local Legends and Best Kept Secrets but certainly more authoritative, this compendium of legends should appeal to residents of the Garden State interested in local lore as well as American historians.