Author and newspaper journalist Joe Tennis admits that he’s a bit less of a skeptic about ghosts and apparitions since an incident in Patrick County that left him unnerved. (See review that follows). That experience did not stop Tennis (Bristol Herald Courier, Kingsport Times-News, etc.) from turning out several books on other worldly phenomena.
“I had a feeling … something else was there,” said Tennis of his own possible encounter with the other side. “I was completely paralyzed by this fear I had of something else being in the home. There was a complete heaviness inside that house.”
His newest, “Haunts of Virginia’s Blue Ridge Highlands” (History Press) will be the subject when Tennis appears at two local book signings next week: Barnes & Noble, Tanglewood, on Oct. 22 from 5 to 7 p.m. and at Ram’s Head Book Shop, Oct. 23, 1-3 p.m.
Several of the incidents that were relayed to him for the book take place in the Roanoke area, from the wispy woman of Roanoke College (who haunted a long gone building once used by the school) to the ghost of Mrs. Figgat, who haunted her old home in Fincastle.
In his slim book, Tennis relays ghost stories at venues that roughly follow the path of the Crooked Road music trail, from Rocky Mount to the Cumberland Gap and Critz. “I took a very detached view throughout the book,” said Tennis, acknowledging that some of the stories are old folk tales.
Tennis wants readers to make up their own minds about what they might believe regarding ghosts and apparitions. “I want people to say hey, there just may be some things we can’t explain … that there are some mysteries in this world … that science can’t explain.”
“Haunts” marks Tennis’s first new book in two years. His others include “Beach to Bluegrass,” and a small volume called “The Marble and Other Ghost Tales of Tennessee and Virginia” (Backyard Books). – By Gene Marrano
Review: Joe Tennis has produced an interesting collection of Southwest Virginia ghost stories, Haunts of Virginia’s Blue Ridge Highlands, just in time for Halloween.
Tennis, scouring back-roads, the accounts of storytellers and old histories, has collected a bunch of legends, first-person accounts and newspaper stories from county seats, old houses and any place he could find a ghost tale. One of the best is the “apparition in white,” captured in a photograph at Avenel in Bedford. There was also a salesman said to be lost in “Murder Hole” in Craig County.
The writer had his own scary experience while stopping for the night at the Reynolds Homestead in Patrick County. He was convinced that “some presence” was behind his bedroom door but he found nothing. Tennis lays out the stories and lets readers draw their own conclusions about the reality of these accounts. He packs 36 ghost stories in this 109-page book. – By George Kegley
