The world is a very strange place. Considering just how broad a range of topics make up what has become known to the general public as Forteana, any attempt at corralling those tall tales and damned facts into a manageable collection is bound to be flawed. Yet The Rough Guide to Unexplained Phenomena remains the best attempt at such a potentially thankless task in print, and while far from perfect definitely does the job well. As suits the subject matter on hand the book itself is an anomaly, hailing from a series better known for its gazetteers and travel journals. So how this got published at all has always intrigued me.

Origins aside, Bob Rickard and John Michell have collected well over four hundred pages of the strangest topics lurking at the very edges of human experience. These range from the ever popular Abominable Snowman to Zarif the Calculating Horse, and plenty of odd happenings in between. Cattle mutilations get a mention, as do the little green men supposedly responsible. Man eating trees and invisible assailants. Sea monsters and frog falls. Crop circles, out of place artifacts and magnetic people. Anyone even tangentially familiar with shows such as X-Files or Sightings will know what to expect.

There are twelve main sections full to the brim with such liminal strangeness, while the thirteenth offers a solid set of external resources that can be accessed to explore those topics further. This structure is arranged in a way that will be make sense to anyone who has read the books of Charles Fort, and uses broad titles such as Strange Rain or Wild Talents to link the narrative together. It is not all text though, as a number of illustrations accompany the articles, along with some genuinely creepy black and white photographs too. The quality can vary on these, however, and the details are sometimes difficult to make out.

Readers who gave negative reviews to The Rough Guide to Unexplained Phenomena may have missed the point of the book. It is a primer, first and foremost, and in some ways represents what a psuedo-academic scrapbook of weird and bizarre topics from the pre-internet age would really look like. None of the entries are necessarily in depth or fully referenced, true. But considering that many of the sources could themselves be considered dubious at best, full citations would likely be pointless anyway. The text has definitely aged a little, and while the information is still useful as a jumping off point it is far from up to date.

Ultimately this book is an easy recommendation, not only to those with an interest in Fortean topics but also for anyone who likes to explore the weirder side of the news cycle. Members of the potential audience who prefer to have a more skeptical evaluation of pseudo-scientific events may want to look elsewhere though, as that is definitely lacking. A staple of secondhand sellers online, both the first and second editions are available in various conditions for a fraction of the original cover price, making this the most accessible and cost effective gateway to the strange and unusual out there so far.

Title: The Rough Guide To Unexplained Phenomena
Author: Bob Rickard and John Michell
Genre: Paranormal Non-Fiction
Tradition: Fortean
Difficulty: Starter
Published: 2000 (2007 for the Second Edition)
ISBN: 9781843537083
Score: 7/10