The Spirit Quest Chronicles

by Ruel S. de Vera, Tony Pérez (Introduction)

From the pages of the Philippine Daily Inquirer, here is Ruel S. De Vera's fascinating series on the Spirit Questors, a band of young psychic volunteers who encounter and communicate with spirits and elementals. Inside are accounts of the Questor's visits to houses and offices, and even to the Manila Film Center. These are true-to-life journeys into the supernatural -- all of them reminders of the redemptive power of love. "The Philippines abounds with psychic phenomena. On top of everything, more and more young people seem to be awakening their psychic powers. They are the successor generation who will eventually replace, in the 2000s, the accepted few today... There is a greater pattern behind our young people's interest in spirit questing, and there is a greater pattern behind the writing of this book. It is up to us step backward and survey the entire picture and afterwards learn to appreciate it." --- from the Introduction by Tony Perez

131 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1997

Reviews

[K.D. Absolutely · Rating 3 out of 5]

My primary gauge to say whether I liked a horror book is if it gave me goosebumps while reading. This book, my first by Ruel S. de Vera, did. I read this one or two articles at a time while doing my thing in the morning before 6am everyday and after a couple of weeks, I finished the whole book.

This is composed of 12 previously-published articles that the author wrote for Philippine Daily Inquirer. They are all about the sessions that the exclusive team by the paranormal writer, Tony Pérez, a Filipino who teaches paranormal subjects in the rich kids' schools like Ateneo de Manila and De La Salle University. The sessions are about communicating with the dead people whose spirits are still lingering on earth because of an unfinished business. So, the good professor and his rich wheeled minions, armed by their paraphernalias like the pendulum, compass, ouija board, spirit of the glass board, troop to the place where spirits are reported to be haunting the living. Their objective, so they say, is to comfort these spirits and encourage them to follow the light that will bring them to the other world. Because they are the only ones who see the spirits I am not sure if they are telling the truth or if they just make these sightings all up. But they are rich kids so we don't know if they are just bored in their privileged lives and they do this just to get out of boredom or just to get their some attention from superstitious people who still believe on these things.

One of these people is me, by the way. I saw the spirit of my dying paternal grandmother when she was dying here in Manila in 1984 and I was there in Baguio, her boarding house. I saw her fleeting image, like a smoke, traversing the sala while I was their on top of my double-deck bed reviewing for my exams in college. From then on, I started to believe in ghosts and spirits.

Fast forward, 30 years later. Now, I don't readily believe on things. Maybe it's my age. Or maybe, I still do but not on these spirit questers and the silly things they do.

However, do you want to know, what makes reading this book creepy? It's the illustrations of the spirits based on the visionaries or medium (the people who actually see them). Read the book, then look at the picture and it will creep the hell out of you.

Try it.

[C.J. Edmunds · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I first heard about Spirit Questors back then I've always fancied being part of an eclectic group of psychics, clairvoyants and spirit-sensitive individuals. And after reading this first compiled account of their "expeditions" and sessions in helping spirits that were in need of guidance in order to completely move on, I learned more of their selfless act of conversing and convincing disembodied spirits to "go toward the light".

This first volume collects their different encounters as published throughout the years over the Philippine Daily Enquirer, and compiled by Ruel De Vera who began writing for the said publication since 1996.

After finishing this first volume, you could easily call these Questors as Spirit Whisperers where they offer comfort, solace and assertion to those who remain earthbound and refusing to move on, but each and every trek that they do is indeed a quest. One that is rooted in selflessness, compassion and love.

Bravo Questors.

[Tito Quiling, Jr. · Rating 3 out of 5]

This compilation of essays from a column in one of the country's prominent newspapers was a fast read, and does not diverge much from the brevity of a broadsheet piece. The bulk of the essays had an even narration, that is, it builds up quite nicely--from the author's objective to the group's setting as a class/volunteer adventure of sort, to joining a few veterans, and to the actual seances held in the haunted Manila Film Center.

One of the good qualities of the book is that it does not try to persuade you at all to believe in the supernatural, as the author puts forward their experiences as it happens. What is perhaps is its downfall is the patronizing tone to the historical thrust, since Madame is almost unmentioned althroughout the narrative and is painted as a neutral figure.

[Jay-r Trinidad · Rating 3 out of 5]

"During that lunch Mrs. Marcos expressed a wish to find out what really happened there, for she didn't know that anyone had been buried there." (referring to the Manila Film Center)

UGH!