The scope of this blog covers anything remotely spooky. I don’t believe in ghosts, but I like ghost stories, and I’m moderately interested in how a person would go about hunting a phantom. I read this book because it was very short, and I had some time to kill.

I suppose I expected a manual explaining the best methods to lure a specter out from underneath the stairs, followed by an appendix with tips on how to stop ectoplasm samples from dissipating. Maybe there would be a chart describing the different varieties of apparitions. Nope. That’s nothing close to what this book is.

Dean Russell (or Dr. Dean Russell) is an “organizational effectiveness consultant”. I think this means that he goes into companies to help them figure out how to operate more efficiently. That’s a respectable thing to do, and Dean seems to be pretty successful at it. His resume is probably pretty impressive to business people. In this book he has taken his knowledge of business and project management and applied it to the field of ghost hunting.

None of the advice given in this guide relates to anything spooky or supernatural. It’s all stuff about how to build an efficient team, how to budget an adventure and how to prepare for and deal with any setbacks you face during your outing.

Realistically, a ghost hunter probably should pay close attention to the above topics before stepping foot in a haunted house. They are practical considerations for almost any professional outing. They are also the kind of things that people who go ghost hunting probably don’t bother with.

If I was actually a ghost hunter, this book might give me pause for thought. I am not a ghost hunter though. I’m just a weirdo who likes creepy books, so I was just mildly amused at this strange little text. Dean Russell has also written a few novels about a guitar playing ghost fighter. Maybe I’ll give them a go some day.