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Lily Dale: The True Story of the Town that Talks to the Dead
Instead, spirits flit among the elms and stroll along the streets, sometimes dressed in garb more common 120 years ago, when Lily Dale was founded and suffragette Susan B. Anthony was a frequent guest. According to Spiritualists who have ruled this Victorian hamlet for five generations, the dead don't go away and they stay anything but quiet. Every summer twenty thousand guests come to consult the town's mediums, who can hang out a shingle only after passing a test that confirms their connection to the spirit world. On the hot June day when reporter Christine Wicker comes to the world's oldest and largest Spiritualist community, she is determined to understand the secret forces -- human or otherwise -- that keep Lily Dale alive. She follows three a newly bereaved widow; a mother whose son killed himself; and a beautiful, happily married wife whose first visit to Lily Dale brings an ominous warning. Are the mediums cold-hearted charlatans, as Sinclair Lewis wrote of them? Or are they conduits for a hidden world that longs to bring peace and healing to the living, as psychologist William James and muckraker Upton Sinclair once hoped to prove? Investigating a movement that attracted millions of Americans in the 1800s and now barely survives, Wicker moves beyond the mediums' front parlors and into the lives that tourists never see. She follows the mediums to a place where what we know and how we know it is the greatest mystery of all.
282 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2003
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July 21, 2019
A disclaimer and some background: I don't believe in ghosts, ESP, tarot or anything like that but neither will I mock them (in this review). I got the book because I read an article on Lily Dale that piqued my interest, and I'm glad I did.
Lily Dale is a lovely small town in upstate New York that arose from the spiritualist movement popularized by the Fox sisters in the mid 1800s. Their contrived table rapping, cheesecloth ectoplasm, fake spirit voices and other tricks played a big role in spreading the movement and they made a long career of it. Along the way they attracted a lot of followers, including some renowned intellectuals (and Conan Doyle believed in fairies). Eventually the Fox family home was moved to Lily Dale. They are commemorated in the museum there. Late in life one of the sisters confessed that it was all a hoax gone viral. But what they had set in motion took on an afterlife of its own.
Today Lily Dale is entirely populated by professed mediums, psychics, tarot readers and the like. People come from all over the world, especially in summer, for one-on-one psychic and tarot readings; to make contact with the dead; attend group sessions; hear lectures by residents and talks by prominent believers like John Edwards. Newcomers stroll the lanes reading signs outside the quaint homes, deciding which to enter. Regulars visit residents upon whom they rely.
It's an easy read and a good book. Christine Wicker writes well. She describes the people and places vividly. Wicker doesn't buy into what happens there nor does she dismiss it. She's not condescending to the residents, the visitors or the reader. Believers will like the book for obvious reasons. For me the enjoyment was in reading about another eccentric piece of the puzzle that is this world.
Lily Dale is a lovely small town in upstate New York that arose from the spiritualist movement popularized by the Fox sisters in the mid 1800s. Their contrived table rapping, cheesecloth ectoplasm, fake spirit voices and other tricks played a big role in spreading the movement and they made a long career of it. Along the way they attracted a lot of followers, including some renowned intellectuals (and Conan Doyle believed in fairies). Eventually the Fox family home was moved to Lily Dale. They are commemorated in the museum there. Late in life one of the sisters confessed that it was all a hoax gone viral. But what they had set in motion took on an afterlife of its own.
Today Lily Dale is entirely populated by professed mediums, psychics, tarot readers and the like. People come from all over the world, especially in summer, for one-on-one psychic and tarot readings; to make contact with the dead; attend group sessions; hear lectures by residents and talks by prominent believers like John Edwards. Newcomers stroll the lanes reading signs outside the quaint homes, deciding which to enter. Regulars visit residents upon whom they rely.
It's an easy read and a good book. Christine Wicker writes well. She describes the people and places vividly. Wicker doesn't buy into what happens there nor does she dismiss it. She's not condescending to the residents, the visitors or the reader. Believers will like the book for obvious reasons. For me the enjoyment was in reading about another eccentric piece of the puzzle that is this world.
June 1, 2016
I actually heard of Lily Dale through an old episode of the television show “Supernatural.” A psychics and mediums-themed town sounded quirky and interesting – sort of like Colonial Williamsburg or Gatlinburg, but …. different! Also, I have books on the supernatural-related investigations of William James and the Spiritualist beliefs of Arthur Conan Doyle in my TBR stacks, and Lily Dale, founded during the same period in which these men were actively working in the Spiritualist movement, seemed like it might offer another angle into the subject.
There was a community near the town where I went to college in Florida called Cassadaga which was known for psychics, and I was never curious enough about it to visit, but now that I’m older (much older) I’ve developed more of an interest in the variety of things people believe and why they believe them. (Incidentally, I was interested to learn that the Florida “Cassadaga” takes its name from a lake in Lily Dale. Apparently George P. Colby, a New York medium, spent time at spiritualist meetings in Lily Dale and was instructed by his spirit guide to go to Florida and start a new spiritualist camp, which he actually did in 1895.) Raised an atheist, I'd have scoffed at spiritualist claims in my college days, and even having converted to Christianity (though many in the corner of the Appalachians where I currently live would argue the distinction between Episcopalians and atheists) I don't find them plausible, but I'm curious anyway. Christine Wicker, a journalist for the Dallas Morning News at the time she wrote this book, seemed to me a promising author for a critical but open-minded book on the subject.
While Wicker does consider the claims of Lily Dale with a reasonable objective attitude, I was disappointed with the book. My two major complaints are the book's disjointed organization and its emphasis on the warm and encouraging women Wicker spends time with rather than on “the true story of the town that talks to the dead,” which is the book's subtitle. The book's structure is a needless series of starts and abrupt stops – reading it feels like driving a car with a failing transmission. Descriptive passages, personal narrative, snippets of human interest stories, a little historical bit, then repeat. She has several women whose stories she tells over the course of the book, but they are so chopped up (the stories, not the women) that I never came to care about them. The same thing goes for the residents of the town – there are too many of them, and they are either “loving earth mothers” or “cryptic teachers,” and they tended to run together for me. I enjoyed the historical sections, but they are short and scarce. There is a great deal about the ways women empower each other, through positive affirmations (“you are amazing and are doing everything right” sort of thing) and through descriptions of the way spirits are visiting and supporting the living (“your dead loved one is happy” and “you have ___ and ___ spirits with you, guiding and protecting you”). Wicker spends a disconcerting amount of time on her own personal history, issues, and feelings, and the ways that the women of Lily Dale make her feel strengthened and so on. She repeatedly claims to be skeptical, and at the same time talks about how imagining that the spirits really are with her, in a good way, is helping her. This would be fine – if she gave no credence to the claims of the Lily Dale practitioners, after all, the story would be merely a dull expose – but there is just too little about Lily Dale, or at least, about the aspects I would find interesting, and too much warm and fuzziness.
One other thing that disappointed me was the scarcity of material on the “theology” of spiritualism. She does explain that it's a fairly freewheeling system, but a little more information than she provides about typical beliefs within the movement would have been nice. Finally, I'd have liked more on the history of the town and how it fit in with the rest of the Chautauqua movement, with its focus on freethinking ideas, lectures, and entertainment.
I was also reading Doris Kearns Goodwin's The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism, about the Progressive movement during the presidencies of Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft, at the time I read Lily Dale: The True Story of the Town That Talks to the Dead, and I was struck by the optimism shown in both movements, Progressivism and Spiritualism, about the possibility of human improvement. In that period, at the very end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century, the willingness of many people to explore new ways of believing and organizing society seems to me rather brave and endearing, despite the fact that this openness often led to fraud and failure. This positive attitude, and the willingness to accept a large portion of error and fakery, is what, in the end, also seems to impress Wicker about the community of Lily Dale. I appreciated her conclusion, in which she notes that the essence of Lily Dale is people finding meaning in their lives in a way that works for them.
This earns 2 ½ stars, and I would recommend it for readers with an interest in the subject and a very high tolerance for rambling narrations and anecdotes about female empowerment.
There was a community near the town where I went to college in Florida called Cassadaga which was known for psychics, and I was never curious enough about it to visit, but now that I’m older (much older) I’ve developed more of an interest in the variety of things people believe and why they believe them. (Incidentally, I was interested to learn that the Florida “Cassadaga” takes its name from a lake in Lily Dale. Apparently George P. Colby, a New York medium, spent time at spiritualist meetings in Lily Dale and was instructed by his spirit guide to go to Florida and start a new spiritualist camp, which he actually did in 1895.) Raised an atheist, I'd have scoffed at spiritualist claims in my college days, and even having converted to Christianity (though many in the corner of the Appalachians where I currently live would argue the distinction between Episcopalians and atheists) I don't find them plausible, but I'm curious anyway. Christine Wicker, a journalist for the Dallas Morning News at the time she wrote this book, seemed to me a promising author for a critical but open-minded book on the subject.
While Wicker does consider the claims of Lily Dale with a reasonable objective attitude, I was disappointed with the book. My two major complaints are the book's disjointed organization and its emphasis on the warm and encouraging women Wicker spends time with rather than on “the true story of the town that talks to the dead,” which is the book's subtitle. The book's structure is a needless series of starts and abrupt stops – reading it feels like driving a car with a failing transmission. Descriptive passages, personal narrative, snippets of human interest stories, a little historical bit, then repeat. She has several women whose stories she tells over the course of the book, but they are so chopped up (the stories, not the women) that I never came to care about them. The same thing goes for the residents of the town – there are too many of them, and they are either “loving earth mothers” or “cryptic teachers,” and they tended to run together for me. I enjoyed the historical sections, but they are short and scarce. There is a great deal about the ways women empower each other, through positive affirmations (“you are amazing and are doing everything right” sort of thing) and through descriptions of the way spirits are visiting and supporting the living (“your dead loved one is happy” and “you have ___ and ___ spirits with you, guiding and protecting you”). Wicker spends a disconcerting amount of time on her own personal history, issues, and feelings, and the ways that the women of Lily Dale make her feel strengthened and so on. She repeatedly claims to be skeptical, and at the same time talks about how imagining that the spirits really are with her, in a good way, is helping her. This would be fine – if she gave no credence to the claims of the Lily Dale practitioners, after all, the story would be merely a dull expose – but there is just too little about Lily Dale, or at least, about the aspects I would find interesting, and too much warm and fuzziness.
One other thing that disappointed me was the scarcity of material on the “theology” of spiritualism. She does explain that it's a fairly freewheeling system, but a little more information than she provides about typical beliefs within the movement would have been nice. Finally, I'd have liked more on the history of the town and how it fit in with the rest of the Chautauqua movement, with its focus on freethinking ideas, lectures, and entertainment.
I was also reading Doris Kearns Goodwin's The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism, about the Progressive movement during the presidencies of Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft, at the time I read Lily Dale: The True Story of the Town That Talks to the Dead, and I was struck by the optimism shown in both movements, Progressivism and Spiritualism, about the possibility of human improvement. In that period, at the very end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century, the willingness of many people to explore new ways of believing and organizing society seems to me rather brave and endearing, despite the fact that this openness often led to fraud and failure. This positive attitude, and the willingness to accept a large portion of error and fakery, is what, in the end, also seems to impress Wicker about the community of Lily Dale. I appreciated her conclusion, in which she notes that the essence of Lily Dale is people finding meaning in their lives in a way that works for them.
”The mediums and their clients work together. They may or may not bring in spirit helpers. I'm not sure it matters whether we agree on that. What does matter is that human beings make meaning out of their experiences. They pull purpose and direction out of their lives. Maybe that universal human tendency is based on delusion; maybe it's based on a deeper wisdom than our conscious minds understand. Maybe other people tap into those unconscious streams to help. Maybe a host of spirits and extrasensory perceptions help too....
I learned long ago that spiritual growth is about walking into mystery. It's about confronting the paradox at the heart of every answer. Are the mediums right? Yes. Are the mediums wrong? Yes. After Chapman didn't show up in the psychomanteum, Shelley recommitted herself to living with doubt. She began to say that everything was explainable except 2 percent, and even that fraction wasn't necessarily transcendent. It just held out the possibility. Living between belief and disbelief was a comfortable place to her. Maybe that tension gives us the best place for understanding the true nature of reality, the best place for new surprises and discoveries, even the best place for spiritual growth.”
This earns 2 ½ stars, and I would recommend it for readers with an interest in the subject and a very high tolerance for rambling narrations and anecdotes about female empowerment.
April 28, 2018
I’m actually giving this 3 1/2 stars. I expected this to be a straightforward history of Lily Dale, but instead it was more anecdotal, about the author’s experiences there and her search for her own answers about psychic abilities and life after death, as well as other people’s experiences there. While it was interesting, I found her writing too rambling and disjointed. She would start to write about someone’s experiences in Lily Dale, and then shift to someone else and not continue with the first person for several chapters. She left me with an overall negative impression of Lily Dale, and that it’s not a place I’d care to visit. Maybe I will anyway, some day. I would still like to find something more on the history of the village. Recommended with reservations.
December 8, 2020
Rarely do I regret the things I read. Or if I do, it's usually around page 25, where I decide that life is simply too darn short to read bad books.
Reader, I regret this book.
The problems I have with this book boil down: authorial insert, authorial snark, poor organization, yet more authorial insert, and simply not having enough material to fill 300 pages.
Now, any one of those problems can be a deal-breaker, but taken all together, they are the kiss of death (ha ha). So why did I bother finishing this book?
The subject matter is admittedly fascinating. I'm fascinated by US history, I'm fascinated by fringe religious movements, and the spiritual communication aspect is just a bonus. So, like many of the people in this book, I just had faith that the author would be able to DO SOMETHING with all the source material. (Plus, by the time I get 2/3 of the way through the book, I feel like I'm committed. Ymmv.)
What the author did with this source material is center herself in the story, and continue to relate her feelings on the topic as she interviewed subjects for the book, and then relate how her feelings on the topic changed, between interviews. This created an almost unbelievable ourobouros of authorial insertion. Like, ma'am, could you please, for one second quit relating how you feel about the interview you're relating and just relate the interview?
Or maybe could you spend some time describing Lily Dale and its surroundings? Because I just spent 300 pages there and did not take away a single vivid image or single defining moment. You are not good at describing, except for when it comes to your feelings, author. Holy crow.
What I did not know, going in, is that the author was, at the time of writing, a reporter covering the religious beat for the Dallas Morning News -- and she mentions that very early on. Given that, I would have expected that the author would have strong feelings on the topic of life after death.
Alas, the author does not. The author has a lot of questions about the topic (good for a reporter!) and relates all those questions in the course of this book (bad for a reader!) while expressing continual disdain for her chosen topic and interviewees:
One useful thing I did learn from the book is that Lily Dale is not actually a town. Yes, the book's title is a straight-up lie. Lily Dale, for religious reasons, is a gated community. And that is all the author says about that, despite the fact that gated communities need some good old fashioned looking at, even back in 2003, and especially when they are 94% white.
Did you see what I did there, by including a link to where I found that statistic about Lily Dale's racial makeup? It's called citing your sources, and it's something the author does not do, despite including many interesting anecdotes from the history of people who have tried to discredit Lily Dale, plus Carl Jung and one of the original founders of quantum theory.
That's right, this book has no bibliography, or list of works cited. Instead, it has a "Suggested Reading on Spiritualism and Psychic Phenomena" section at the end.
Y'all, did... did a reporter write this book? I am so confused.
Honestly, the most fun thing about this book has been writing the review, and even then, I think this review is even better.
Next time someone please stop me before I hit the 200-page point of no return...
Reader, I regret this book.
The problems I have with this book boil down: authorial insert, authorial snark, poor organization, yet more authorial insert, and simply not having enough material to fill 300 pages.
Now, any one of those problems can be a deal-breaker, but taken all together, they are the kiss of death (ha ha). So why did I bother finishing this book?
The subject matter is admittedly fascinating. I'm fascinated by US history, I'm fascinated by fringe religious movements, and the spiritual communication aspect is just a bonus. So, like many of the people in this book, I just had faith that the author would be able to DO SOMETHING with all the source material. (Plus, by the time I get 2/3 of the way through the book, I feel like I'm committed. Ymmv.)
What the author did with this source material is center herself in the story, and continue to relate her feelings on the topic as she interviewed subjects for the book, and then relate how her feelings on the topic changed, between interviews. This created an almost unbelievable ourobouros of authorial insertion. Like, ma'am, could you please, for one second quit relating how you feel about the interview you're relating and just relate the interview?
Or maybe could you spend some time describing Lily Dale and its surroundings? Because I just spent 300 pages there and did not take away a single vivid image or single defining moment. You are not good at describing, except for when it comes to your feelings, author. Holy crow.
What I did not know, going in, is that the author was, at the time of writing, a reporter covering the religious beat for the Dallas Morning News -- and she mentions that very early on. Given that, I would have expected that the author would have strong feelings on the topic of life after death.
Alas, the author does not. The author has a lot of questions about the topic (good for a reporter!) and relates all those questions in the course of this book (bad for a reader!) while expressing continual disdain for her chosen topic and interviewees:
Weird never puts me off. I like it, and usually I understand it. In Lily Dale, some people were nervous about talking to me, but I told them straight out that I had not come to ridicule. "You're afraid I'm going to write something that will make you seem crazy. Don't worry about that," I told them. "Everybody thinks you're nuts already. So there's no story there.
One useful thing I did learn from the book is that Lily Dale is not actually a town. Yes, the book's title is a straight-up lie. Lily Dale, for religious reasons, is a gated community. And that is all the author says about that, despite the fact that gated communities need some good old fashioned looking at, even back in 2003, and especially when they are 94% white.
Did you see what I did there, by including a link to where I found that statistic about Lily Dale's racial makeup? It's called citing your sources, and it's something the author does not do, despite including many interesting anecdotes from the history of people who have tried to discredit Lily Dale, plus Carl Jung and one of the original founders of quantum theory.
That's right, this book has no bibliography, or list of works cited. Instead, it has a "Suggested Reading on Spiritualism and Psychic Phenomena" section at the end.
Y'all, did... did a reporter write this book? I am so confused.
Honestly, the most fun thing about this book has been writing the review, and even then, I think this review is even better.
Next time someone please stop me before I hit the 200-page point of no return...
August 3, 2014
I picked this book up one morning on the cruise ship, when it was still only maybe 5AM & I couldn't sleep so I went to the library. It was in the unlocked take one-leave one cabinets. I think it meant for me to find it. I'd never heard of the Lily Dale community, but I live in FL & have heard about Cassadega, in central FL, which is named after the lake in Lily Dale. It's a Spiritualist community, full of those who can commune with spirits, those who believes that life does indeed go on beyond the veil. I'm no medium, but I do believe, & that's why the book just HAD to come home with me from the trip.
September 11, 2007
Lily Dale, the town: a place inhabited by the remnant of a religion started two centuries ago by two adolescent girls who believed they could talk to the dead.
Lily Dale, the book: yet another disappointment in my continued efforts to research Spiritualism. The author spends far too much time regurgitating her personal impressions and not enough time expanding upon the rich history of this enchanting place. This might have been bearable if the author was somewhat interesting but she's a total bore.
Some more positive notes: I desperately want to meet all of the inhabitants of this scarcely populated town. And I'd like to visit there. Not even shoddy writing could take that from me. I also found the couple who use witching rods to grocery shop to be fascinating. I intend to tell my boyfriend's parent's about it this weekend. The book also mentioned several other studies on Lily Dale/Spiritualism that I intend to read immediately. I've added them all to my "to-read list" as they all seem to be written by intelligent enlightened souls who might shed some light on this topic (eg: Carl Jung and Einstein among others).
Lily Dale, the book: yet another disappointment in my continued efforts to research Spiritualism. The author spends far too much time regurgitating her personal impressions and not enough time expanding upon the rich history of this enchanting place. This might have been bearable if the author was somewhat interesting but she's a total bore.
Some more positive notes: I desperately want to meet all of the inhabitants of this scarcely populated town. And I'd like to visit there. Not even shoddy writing could take that from me. I also found the couple who use witching rods to grocery shop to be fascinating. I intend to tell my boyfriend's parent's about it this weekend. The book also mentioned several other studies on Lily Dale/Spiritualism that I intend to read immediately. I've added them all to my "to-read list" as they all seem to be written by intelligent enlightened souls who might shed some light on this topic (eg: Carl Jung and Einstein among others).
June 26, 2023
I grew up near Lily Dale. I remember it (from the late 80s / early 90s) as a quiet, quaint little village with narrow streets that wound around petite, slightly rundown gingerbread cottages. You didn't really drive around Lily Dale; instead, you parked near the gift shop just inside the gate and walked - partly due to those narrow, one-lane streets (as well as a number of friendly outdoor cats that liked to sun themselves on the pavement) but mostly because a large part of the Lily Dale experience was rambling from house to house looking for a sign that the psychic/owner was performing readings that day and then putting your name down on the self-service list they'd left by the door. That's how you made appointments back then. The town also offered classes and lectures in a variety of psychic and New Age topics.
Everything changed after the HBO documentary aired and this book was published in the early 2000s. People wanted to see Lily Dale for themselves, and suddenly there were crowds to navigate and cars driving too fast down those little lanes. The lectures began to attract big names - Deepak Chopra, Dr. Wayne Dyer, and the guys from Ghost Hunters. The prices went up. The psychics started booking all of their appointments online, and it became impossible to get any walk-in readings. I'm happy for their success. I really am. The people I met there were lovely and deserve success. But I can't help but feel that something's been lost, and the people who go there now looking for that quaint village will instead find tourists and overpriced incense. It's been 15 years since I visited, and I don't think I'll ever go back again.
That said, I gave this book 2 stars based on its content rather than on its real-world impact on the town. Wicker writes about Spiritualism with a respectful skepticism calculated to appeal to (or at least not offend) readers of all beliefs, and the tone suits her subject matter. She also seems to have a great deal of affection for the residents she interviews and gets to know during the course of her research. However, she frequently meanders, goes off on numerous tangents, and inserts herself into the book quite a bit. She uses her own unanswered questions about psychic phenomena and life after death to shape and propel the narrative, causing the book to veer away from The True Story of the Town That Talks to the Dead and morph into something closer to a memoir or a collection of personal essays. I also think the material could easily have been cut down by 50 pages.
A book has to be really, really bad for me not to finish it, and Lily Dale is not anywhere near that. It's not really, really good either. I finished it, but it was rough toward the end because I'd lost interest long before I turned the last page.
Everything changed after the HBO documentary aired and this book was published in the early 2000s. People wanted to see Lily Dale for themselves, and suddenly there were crowds to navigate and cars driving too fast down those little lanes. The lectures began to attract big names - Deepak Chopra, Dr. Wayne Dyer, and the guys from Ghost Hunters. The prices went up. The psychics started booking all of their appointments online, and it became impossible to get any walk-in readings. I'm happy for their success. I really am. The people I met there were lovely and deserve success. But I can't help but feel that something's been lost, and the people who go there now looking for that quaint village will instead find tourists and overpriced incense. It's been 15 years since I visited, and I don't think I'll ever go back again.
That said, I gave this book 2 stars based on its content rather than on its real-world impact on the town. Wicker writes about Spiritualism with a respectful skepticism calculated to appeal to (or at least not offend) readers of all beliefs, and the tone suits her subject matter. She also seems to have a great deal of affection for the residents she interviews and gets to know during the course of her research. However, she frequently meanders, goes off on numerous tangents, and inserts herself into the book quite a bit. She uses her own unanswered questions about psychic phenomena and life after death to shape and propel the narrative, causing the book to veer away from The True Story of the Town That Talks to the Dead and morph into something closer to a memoir or a collection of personal essays. I also think the material could easily have been cut down by 50 pages.
A book has to be really, really bad for me not to finish it, and Lily Dale is not anywhere near that. It's not really, really good either. I finished it, but it was rough toward the end because I'd lost interest long before I turned the last page.
November 21, 2007
I'd read another book by the author last month Not In Kansas Anymore and enjoyed her writing style, as well as her open-minded skepticism.
---------------
Lily Dale, in upstate New York, is one of the last bastions of Spiritualism - reaching its height of popularity around the turn of the 20th century, with another big boost after the flu epidemic of 1918. Most of the townspeople are still Spiritualists & hold various seminars, camps and other gatherings for those wishing to learn about their future or contact loved ones who have passed on.
Wicker spent parts of 3 years "plumbing the mysteries" of this town, which "resembles nothing so much as a sororial sleepover for aging sisters." As a reporter on religion for the Dallas Morning News - "weird never puts me off. I like it, and usually I understand it." She found herself challenging both her beliefs and those of the community quite a bit over the course of her visits. She talked with any and everyone she could - the mediums (who tend to be middle-aged, plumpish and unmarried: another townsperson joked about going out & changing all the sign references from "medium" to "large"), the clients as well as the other townsfolk.
She found that the children of the Spiritualists often tend towards "a conservative, rather disapproving" Christianity, probably as a backlash against the New Agishness belief structure of their parents/mothers. Wicker also had some difficulties getting the kind of responses she was looking for from the mediums - she compared it at times to being George Burns talking to Gracie Allen. She realizes her strict Baptist upbringing may be part of the problem: "We aren't here to be happy. We're here to be good. Most of us don't have what it takes to be good, of course, which means we have to be guilty."
Even when she takes a class - and ends up giving some fairly accurate readings/messages - Wicker feels as if she's making it all up, somehow. She finally admits there is something to Spiritualism, but whether it's tapping into the spirit world or the subconscious, it's hard to tell.
Recommended to anyone interested in psychic phenomena/New Age beliefs as well as the history of the Spiritualist movement; however, you won't get much history of the town itself from this book.
---------------
Lily Dale, in upstate New York, is one of the last bastions of Spiritualism - reaching its height of popularity around the turn of the 20th century, with another big boost after the flu epidemic of 1918. Most of the townspeople are still Spiritualists & hold various seminars, camps and other gatherings for those wishing to learn about their future or contact loved ones who have passed on.
Wicker spent parts of 3 years "plumbing the mysteries" of this town, which "resembles nothing so much as a sororial sleepover for aging sisters." As a reporter on religion for the Dallas Morning News - "weird never puts me off. I like it, and usually I understand it." She found herself challenging both her beliefs and those of the community quite a bit over the course of her visits. She talked with any and everyone she could - the mediums (who tend to be middle-aged, plumpish and unmarried: another townsperson joked about going out & changing all the sign references from "medium" to "large"), the clients as well as the other townsfolk.
She found that the children of the Spiritualists often tend towards "a conservative, rather disapproving" Christianity, probably as a backlash against the New Agishness belief structure of their parents/mothers. Wicker also had some difficulties getting the kind of responses she was looking for from the mediums - she compared it at times to being George Burns talking to Gracie Allen. She realizes her strict Baptist upbringing may be part of the problem: "We aren't here to be happy. We're here to be good. Most of us don't have what it takes to be good, of course, which means we have to be guilty."
Even when she takes a class - and ends up giving some fairly accurate readings/messages - Wicker feels as if she's making it all up, somehow. She finally admits there is something to Spiritualism, but whether it's tapping into the spirit world or the subconscious, it's hard to tell.
Recommended to anyone interested in psychic phenomena/New Age beliefs as well as the history of the Spiritualist movement; however, you won't get much history of the town itself from this book.
June 10, 2008
This a subject account of the author's experiences with and feelings about the spiritualism community. I was looking for more of a history (how it was founded, how other people at the time reacted, and so on), so it wasn't very satisfying to me. People looking for primarily contemporary accounts may like it better, although I feel that it may still be rather unfocused.
Also, does anyone know if there was some big story about Lily dale in the past few years to bring it to public attention? Because this is the 4th book I've encountered this year that had something to do with it, and I don't remember hearing about it at all previously.
Also, does anyone know if there was some big story about Lily dale in the past few years to bring it to public attention? Because this is the 4th book I've encountered this year that had something to do with it, and I don't remember hearing about it at all previously.
August 23, 2007
Written by a journalist, the book tries to maintain a balance between belief and skepticism but this causes it to lose some of the ability to draw the reader in and keep him hooked. An interesting read but her storytelling technique is sometimes a bit scattered. An easy book to pick up after an absence.
February 26, 2009
This is a very well researched book about trance mediums and Spiritualism in the New York town of Lilly Dale. Even though I have been a trance medium for over 30 years, I learned some very interesting things. I feel Ms. Wicker was fair, funny, and fortunate in writing this book. It jumps around a bit, but it gets pulled together in the end.
September 18, 2007
I read this right before i went to Lily Dale, and it really gave me a lot of insight into what i was getting into. Many of the 'characters' were actually in the town. a must read if you are going there, or just interested in the history of the place.
December 2, 2007
I heard the author being interviewed on the Diane Rehm Show on NPR and I knew I had to read the book. It is a fascinating read and is not scary at all for those of you who squirm at the thought of ghosts.
April 3, 2023
When I was a teenager, I loved reading about the supernatural: ghosts, haunted houses, ESP; I used to wish I had a sixth sense and the ability to read minds and would lie in my bed at night attempting to levitate or travel out of my body. I still believe in the spirit world, in places that hold the energy of those who lived there before. I'm not always convinced of the abilities of spiritualists who claim to receive images and messages from the deceased.
I picked up this book at a thrift store, intrigued by the title. A quick glance at the back cover, about a town in upstate New York that has been a mecca for mediums and spiritualists since the 19th century. Who knew?
I also love weird histories and had hoped to read a brisk and entertaining little book on the life and times of those who have graced the boarding houses of Lily Dale for more than a century. And there was some of this, but not nearly enough.
There is a strong sense of women's power in the chapters, those who visit and summer in Lily Dale are predominantly female. I have the sense that many who go there are looking for solace and solidarity. Those who are mourning the past are there to seek answers from their loved ones.
I've been to a couple mediums in my life and I have a friend who has done 'readings' for parties and social events and has told me how easy it is to glean small hints to determine what a person wants to hear. I've watched John Edward and other celebrity mediums and I can 'read' their schtick as easily as they 'read' the audience members. The author of this book wavers between belief and trickery, often attending workshops held in Lily Dale to 'teach' new mediums how to hone their skills, or how some 'readings and psychic events' can be manufactured through simple slight of hand.
I'm give this lower rating because the book eventually devolves into the author seeking her own answers to her questions of God and spiritualism and frankly, and the history of the town, its people both past and present, faded into the background. Boring.
I will admit that at some point the author delves into the history of the Spiritualist movement and in defining Spiritualism (because it is a religion for the most part), the athiest in me was more comfortable with the basic tenets of Spiritualism. Maybe that's why I was so intrigued by such matters as a teen.
I picked up this book at a thrift store, intrigued by the title. A quick glance at the back cover, about a town in upstate New York that has been a mecca for mediums and spiritualists since the 19th century. Who knew?
I also love weird histories and had hoped to read a brisk and entertaining little book on the life and times of those who have graced the boarding houses of Lily Dale for more than a century. And there was some of this, but not nearly enough.
There is a strong sense of women's power in the chapters, those who visit and summer in Lily Dale are predominantly female. I have the sense that many who go there are looking for solace and solidarity. Those who are mourning the past are there to seek answers from their loved ones.
I've been to a couple mediums in my life and I have a friend who has done 'readings' for parties and social events and has told me how easy it is to glean small hints to determine what a person wants to hear. I've watched John Edward and other celebrity mediums and I can 'read' their schtick as easily as they 'read' the audience members. The author of this book wavers between belief and trickery, often attending workshops held in Lily Dale to 'teach' new mediums how to hone their skills, or how some 'readings and psychic events' can be manufactured through simple slight of hand.
I'm give this lower rating because the book eventually devolves into the author seeking her own answers to her questions of God and spiritualism and frankly, and the history of the town, its people both past and present, faded into the background. Boring.
I will admit that at some point the author delves into the history of the Spiritualist movement and in defining Spiritualism (because it is a religion for the most part), the athiest in me was more comfortable with the basic tenets of Spiritualism. Maybe that's why I was so intrigued by such matters as a teen.
July 27, 2022
I really enjoyed this book! Being from Western New York and having visited Lily Dale many times it was cool to be so familiar with places the author was talking about. Such as the old time cafeteria, meeting house, the quaint little stores the healing church and of course the stump!! I have walked up and down those one car wide roads many times with friends and family just admiring the different colored old cottages with their window boxes and pots full of flowers all around. Imagine my surprise when the author actually talked about mediums from Lily Dale that I have actually visited!! So cool!
I have had good readings and some not so good. It’s all in what you allow yourself to believe BUT I will say one thing really did happen to me when I was a teenager that has never left me doubting that there is something to be said about it.
I have had good readings and some not so good. It’s all in what you allow yourself to believe BUT I will say one thing really did happen to me when I was a teenager that has never left me doubting that there is something to be said about it.
November 6, 2017
3.5 stars. The book's disconnected, time-lurching structure made it difficult to follow all the characters presented. However, the author's struggle to come to terms with her feelings of "belief" and "non-belief" pretty much echoed my own encounters with Lily Dale, and I enjoyed the read.
April 26, 2020
such a wonderfully engaging read. many of the lily dale residents reminded me of older small-town movies and the women of the town. i could practically feel the wind as lynn biked by and the stillness of walking by The Stump.
incredibly moving and interesting. also, the author 100% looks like the actress she is likened to by a fellow classmate.
incredibly moving and interesting. also, the author 100% looks like the actress she is likened to by a fellow classmate.
October 26, 2023
Lots of interesting stories and viewpoints.
Pretty well told, and I think the approach the author took made sense, though it was sometimes frustrating.
Pretty well told, and I think the approach the author took made sense, though it was sometimes frustrating.
October 21, 2022
Such a pleasant, easy read. At times it was hard to remember that this was a journalist’s account of an actual community, and Lily Dale is now on my list of places to soon visit.
July 28, 2021
I knew from the short bio in the book, that the author had been a reporter covering religion for the Dallas Morning News. I anticipated that, being a journalist, she would know how to research and organize her material, structure her interviews, and provide the reader with a neutral viewpoint. I assumed that she would give us the who,what,when,where, and why. But, more often than not, the book was full of the author’s own reminiscences and incidents from her own life. She sort of rambled.
When she did get back to the interviews they were often summarized in her own words rather than giving us a better flavor of the person she was interviewing. Wicker’s professed doubts and negative outbursts made me start to wonder if she was actually a “true believer” who was just throwing those things in for show, to convince us that she was a neutral observer.
Wicker didn’t use up a lot of pages describing Lily Dale itself. There were eight pages of historic pictures in a clump about 2/3 of the way through the book. Some of the captions weren’t even entirely about the pictures. I would have liked more of the real Lily Dale and maybe a little less musing and introspection.
One intriguing bit of information that the author didn’t really go into very deeply was about the politics and practical aspects of running a hamlet that is also sort of a theme park. The population of Lily Dale is only about 275 people and it is run by some kind of association. There are rules governing ownership of homes in the community.
There was no index and no bibliography, or list of works cited. There are other books about Lily Dale and about religion in western New York in the 19th century, including Spiritualism that I plan to look for. Chronicles of Lily DaleThe Spirits of Lily Dale and The Burned-Over District: The Social and Intellectual History of Enthusiastic Religion in Western New York, 1800-1850.
Lynn’s review was more interesting than the book.
When she did get back to the interviews they were often summarized in her own words rather than giving us a better flavor of the person she was interviewing. Wicker’s professed doubts and negative outbursts made me start to wonder if she was actually a “true believer” who was just throwing those things in for show, to convince us that she was a neutral observer.
Wicker didn’t use up a lot of pages describing Lily Dale itself. There were eight pages of historic pictures in a clump about 2/3 of the way through the book. Some of the captions weren’t even entirely about the pictures. I would have liked more of the real Lily Dale and maybe a little less musing and introspection.
One intriguing bit of information that the author didn’t really go into very deeply was about the politics and practical aspects of running a hamlet that is also sort of a theme park. The population of Lily Dale is only about 275 people and it is run by some kind of association. There are rules governing ownership of homes in the community.
There was no index and no bibliography, or list of works cited. There are other books about Lily Dale and about religion in western New York in the 19th century, including Spiritualism that I plan to look for. Chronicles of Lily DaleThe Spirits of Lily Dale and The Burned-Over District: The Social and Intellectual History of Enthusiastic Religion in Western New York, 1800-1850.
Lynn’s review was more interesting than the book.
September 23, 2009
I liked this book, but not as much as I wanted to.
This is ostensibly a history of Lily Dale, New York -- a community that has been ectoplasmic since the late 1800s. I made my way to the book being most interested in the Victorian/Gilded Age Spiritualist era, rather than the world of today's New Age Feel-Gooderies.
The author's accounts do cover the 1800s happenings a bit, but there's much more time given to the spiritual quests of the current Lily Dale residents, mostly a bunch of spooky-ooky older ladies whom the author resoundingly disbelieves, though she struggles to be open and respectful.
It's not to the author's discredit, really, that she disbelieves them -- come on, these people are table-rappers to rival the Fox Sisters -- but it makes for a less interesting book than would have John Keel style weird-ass credulity.
The author is a former Baptist and a reporter on religious matters, and to be honest I found her more interesting than many of her subjects. The places where I loved this book the most were when she cut loose with her own reminiscences, insecurities and first-person experiences from her outside life. I found that utterly captivating, whereas many of the interview portions felt sort of underdramatized and over-paraphrased.
I assume that's because more direct quotes from the mediums and spiritual seekers in question would have come across like raving and drooling disjointed lunacy, and made them seem far crazier than they actually seem in person. I'm guessing. There's an old reporter's trick -- if the subject's quotes are completely incoherent and weird, best to paraphrase rather than file an incomprehensible story. There's a lot of paraphrasing in this book. Just a thought.
What I did take away from the author, and what made me like her own voice so much, was a sense of compassion for the trials these women have gone through that bring them to that community. Nonetheless, I'm left seeing Earthly reasons for their troubles -- and their questions have financial, feminist, libertine, educational answers for me, not the spiritual ones the mediums and seekers find. The answers are easy, so very easy. The only sacrifice Lily Dale enlightenment requires is death -- which I knew already.
Like I said... I wanted to like this book more than I did. But I suspect it'll stick with me, and I'm actually contemplating a vacation to Lily Dale. I doubt I'll like what I find, but then that's hardly the point, is it?
This is ostensibly a history of Lily Dale, New York -- a community that has been ectoplasmic since the late 1800s. I made my way to the book being most interested in the Victorian/Gilded Age Spiritualist era, rather than the world of today's New Age Feel-Gooderies.
The author's accounts do cover the 1800s happenings a bit, but there's much more time given to the spiritual quests of the current Lily Dale residents, mostly a bunch of spooky-ooky older ladies whom the author resoundingly disbelieves, though she struggles to be open and respectful.
It's not to the author's discredit, really, that she disbelieves them -- come on, these people are table-rappers to rival the Fox Sisters -- but it makes for a less interesting book than would have John Keel style weird-ass credulity.
The author is a former Baptist and a reporter on religious matters, and to be honest I found her more interesting than many of her subjects. The places where I loved this book the most were when she cut loose with her own reminiscences, insecurities and first-person experiences from her outside life. I found that utterly captivating, whereas many of the interview portions felt sort of underdramatized and over-paraphrased.
I assume that's because more direct quotes from the mediums and spiritual seekers in question would have come across like raving and drooling disjointed lunacy, and made them seem far crazier than they actually seem in person. I'm guessing. There's an old reporter's trick -- if the subject's quotes are completely incoherent and weird, best to paraphrase rather than file an incomprehensible story. There's a lot of paraphrasing in this book. Just a thought.
What I did take away from the author, and what made me like her own voice so much, was a sense of compassion for the trials these women have gone through that bring them to that community. Nonetheless, I'm left seeing Earthly reasons for their troubles -- and their questions have financial, feminist, libertine, educational answers for me, not the spiritual ones the mediums and seekers find. The answers are easy, so very easy. The only sacrifice Lily Dale enlightenment requires is death -- which I knew already.
Like I said... I wanted to like this book more than I did. But I suspect it'll stick with me, and I'm actually contemplating a vacation to Lily Dale. I doubt I'll like what I find, but then that's hardly the point, is it?
July 18, 2009
I bought this book because I was vaguely familiar with Lily Dale, NY and I wanted to know more. Bought it at the Chautauqua Institution Bookstore (a great little bookstore!) on the shores of Chautauqua Lake, just south of Cassadaga Lake where the quaint victorian village of Lily Dale was founded in 1879. Then perhaps one of the largest and now oldest Spiritualist communities in America, it has a place in American church history. This area of Western New York, where Spiritualism started, was known in the 1880's as the "burned over district" because of the mighty works of the Holy Spirit and the "fires" of the Christian revivals that swept through repeatedly.
The book is not a page-turner, but interesting enough. The author interviewed many residents and visitors during her summer stay at Lily Dale. She sought out mediums, healers, readers and those who sought those messages and experiences. She sought to discover those gift in herself, but the story moves slowly (not unlike waiting for spiritual gifts of any sort?)
Three quotes: (1) Toward the end of the book, the author talks about how her experience at "the Dale" had begun to "redefine me to myself." (2) As she prepares to leave Lily Dale, she asks a spiritualist "So, what do I do with all this?" The answer? "You live with it. You use it in your life." and (3) "It's as though we live in a big egg . . . every day the shell gets thicker. [The:] spirits [Spirit?:] tap, tap tap away until they break a tiny pinhole in the shell. A strange light comes through. And some of us start to kick our way out."
Maybe this was the right time to read this book! For the past two years, I have been a "pilgrim", participating in the Academy for Spiritual Formation. Gathering with others for a week every three months, adopting a Benedictine schedule of sorts . . . reading, lectures, worship several times a day and Holy Communion daily, silence and reflection. We have been shaped and molded. Now as we come to the end of our time together, I wonder what i do with what I've learned, I think about how I've changed, I contemplate life with out the structure and will I continue the disciplines begun. I find myself changed, but not in ways that are very observable. . . I have perhaps been redefined to myself, I'll have to keep living with it, and keep kicking.
The book is not a page-turner, but interesting enough. The author interviewed many residents and visitors during her summer stay at Lily Dale. She sought out mediums, healers, readers and those who sought those messages and experiences. She sought to discover those gift in herself, but the story moves slowly (not unlike waiting for spiritual gifts of any sort?)
Three quotes: (1) Toward the end of the book, the author talks about how her experience at "the Dale" had begun to "redefine me to myself." (2) As she prepares to leave Lily Dale, she asks a spiritualist "So, what do I do with all this?" The answer? "You live with it. You use it in your life." and (3) "It's as though we live in a big egg . . . every day the shell gets thicker. [The:] spirits [Spirit?:] tap, tap tap away until they break a tiny pinhole in the shell. A strange light comes through. And some of us start to kick our way out."
Maybe this was the right time to read this book! For the past two years, I have been a "pilgrim", participating in the Academy for Spiritual Formation. Gathering with others for a week every three months, adopting a Benedictine schedule of sorts . . . reading, lectures, worship several times a day and Holy Communion daily, silence and reflection. We have been shaped and molded. Now as we come to the end of our time together, I wonder what i do with what I've learned, I think about how I've changed, I contemplate life with out the structure and will I continue the disciplines begun. I find myself changed, but not in ways that are very observable. . . I have perhaps been redefined to myself, I'll have to keep living with it, and keep kicking.
November 28, 2012
Lily Dale, a tiny speck of a place in upstate New York, is so small it's not even considered a town. It's a community--specifically, the oldest Spiritualist community in the United States. Every summer, thousands of visitors flock to Lily Dale hoping to psychic advice, communicate with dead loved ones, spot ghosts, or even to learn how to become mediums themselves. Lily Dale is a place where nearly all of the full-time residents believe that the spirit world and the earthly plane intersect, and the inhabitants of both live harmoniously.
The author's writing maintains a solid balance between healthy skepticism and journalistic neutrality. Though she does not anticipate leaving Lily Dale as a "believer," the people she has met there are communicative and earnest, and they make it possible to understand how and why they believe what they do, even if the reader does not. This book will not make skeptics believe or believers doubt. What it does is deliver a unique insight into a community in which everyone is in
touch with their otherworldly neighbors, and no one bats an eye. Are they all delusional, having gulped the Kool-Aid and fallen into a perpetual state of woo-woo? Having read this enjoyable, informative book, I can only say, who cares?
The author's writing maintains a solid balance between healthy skepticism and journalistic neutrality. Though she does not anticipate leaving Lily Dale as a "believer," the people she has met there are communicative and earnest, and they make it possible to understand how and why they believe what they do, even if the reader does not. This book will not make skeptics believe or believers doubt. What it does is deliver a unique insight into a community in which everyone is in
touch with their otherworldly neighbors, and no one bats an eye. Are they all delusional, having gulped the Kool-Aid and fallen into a perpetual state of woo-woo? Having read this enjoyable, informative book, I can only say, who cares?
September 29, 2014
I was surprised to read a few other reviews of this book that say it is "boring" or that there was too much of the author's thoughts on her experiences as a visitor and too little of the history of Lily Dale.
I'll agree I wanted to read more about Lily Dale, but one author's experiences cannot encompass an entire history of more than 130 years. Aside from that, I don't believe there is a lot of research materials to draw upon to include in a written history of the place. I found the personal notes to be interesting and grounding in what, to me, would have been an otherwise boring book of pure history. There are not many books out there about Lily Dale, and this one written by a journalist visitor is at least a well-written partial history of a fascinating place, the most famous spiritualist encampment in the United States. It does not claim to be more than a personal account, and it was intriguing enough for me to decide after reading that I definitely want to visit. It seems to be that it was intended as an introduction to a place that more people should know about, and that is exactly what I liked about it.
I'll agree I wanted to read more about Lily Dale, but one author's experiences cannot encompass an entire history of more than 130 years. Aside from that, I don't believe there is a lot of research materials to draw upon to include in a written history of the place. I found the personal notes to be interesting and grounding in what, to me, would have been an otherwise boring book of pure history. There are not many books out there about Lily Dale, and this one written by a journalist visitor is at least a well-written partial history of a fascinating place, the most famous spiritualist encampment in the United States. It does not claim to be more than a personal account, and it was intriguing enough for me to decide after reading that I definitely want to visit. It seems to be that it was intended as an introduction to a place that more people should know about, and that is exactly what I liked about it.
June 29, 2013
I really enjoyed this book. I found it very interesting in its historical description of the U.S. spiritualist movement of the late 1800's and early 1900's. This book tied together a lot of things I'd learned about but never formerly associated: Houdini's fascination with spirits, the Conan Doyle/fairy fascination, the Shakers, and how the members of mainstream U.S. religions dealt with this nationwide phenomenon. The mention of the cultural mentality following WWI and the 1918 flue epidemic was also very helpful, I thought.
Why I liked this book: Wicker wrote with a balance of (or vacillation between) skepticism and belief that I probably would've experienced if I had been there. She looks not just at the question of whether the mediums are "real" or not, but also at the motivations and experiences of the people who come looking for answers. I appreciated the detail she put into describing the mediums and how different each of them were.
You won't find answers to the 'big questions' in this book, but you will find a good look behind the curtain at the history of how spiritualism came to be and continues to exist in the American psyche.
Why I liked this book: Wicker wrote with a balance of (or vacillation between) skepticism and belief that I probably would've experienced if I had been there. She looks not just at the question of whether the mediums are "real" or not, but also at the motivations and experiences of the people who come looking for answers. I appreciated the detail she put into describing the mediums and how different each of them were.
You won't find answers to the 'big questions' in this book, but you will find a good look behind the curtain at the history of how spiritualism came to be and continues to exist in the American psyche.
December 21, 2022
I picked this up at a book sale because I’m interested in mediums and psychic phenomenon. This book is a non-fiction account of the author’s research into the town of Lily Dale, New York, which is home to many mediums and spiritualists. It’s billed as “the world’s oldest and largest spiritualist community.” Residents claim to speak to the dead and espouse many new age type beliefs. Every summer season, thousands of visitors come to the town to consult the mediums. The author, a sceptic, goes to investigate.
The author worked as a reporter for many years and her writing on very clear on a sentence level. She has a gift for briefly describing people and their lives. But the structure of the book totally baffled me. It felt very disjointed. Characters were described and I became interested in them, only to have them not mentioned again for many pages. At one point I discovered a character list in the back of the book which editors should have put in the front.
While I enjoyed some aspects of this book, overall I can’t truly recommend it. The indecipherable structure of the book detracted too much from the pleasure of reading it.
The author worked as a reporter for many years and her writing on very clear on a sentence level. She has a gift for briefly describing people and their lives. But the structure of the book totally baffled me. It felt very disjointed. Characters were described and I became interested in them, only to have them not mentioned again for many pages. At one point I discovered a character list in the back of the book which editors should have put in the front.
While I enjoyed some aspects of this book, overall I can’t truly recommend it. The indecipherable structure of the book detracted too much from the pleasure of reading it.
March 31, 2012
I'm only withholding the 5th star because I was anticipating more historical content. I am however, far from disappointed with this book. I read the majority of it in two extended sittings. It does read more like a memoir (which I enjoy). I related to the author and enjoyed her voice. I feel the book is written with a good balance of skepticism and a desire to believe. It was definitely interesting and reminded me of gifts that I may have had but lost along the way. I've been to Lily Dale several times but it has been over a decade since my last visit and I feel the need to return. The book (as the author comments on the town itself) will probably push you to an eye-rolling threshold at times, but ultimately with a sense that something is indeed there. At least least I tend to think so.
Think, is the wrong word. I rely on thinking too much, giving too much credibility to thought over feelings and intuition. This could be a good read for anyone with similar affliction.
Think, is the wrong word. I rely on thinking too much, giving too much credibility to thought over feelings and intuition. This could be a good read for anyone with similar affliction.
December 20, 2019
2.5 stars. Whether or not you believe in people who can speak with the dead and spirits from the great beyond with messages to deliver to the living, the Spiritualist movement and the history of Lily Dale are both really interesting. Unfortunately, I think this book was written by the wrong person. Skepticism is appropriate when researching a subject of this nature, but Wicket often comes across angry and snide rather than approaching her project with genuine curiosity. The book is also very choppy, with various storylines stopping and starting abruptly. It took away a great deal from the stories and flow, and I often found myself having no idea who the author was referring to at the start of a new chapter. I give this 2.5 stars because I enjoyed reading about the various mediums, Lily Dale residents and tourists, most of whom seemed much more fun to hang out with than the author would be!
December 25, 2022
I was excited to read this book but it was very disappointing. I became interested in Lily Dale from the fictional stories by Wendy Corsi Staub. Most of those books were very good. On the back cover of this book by Christine Wicker, it is stated that the author follows three people and tells their stories. Therefore, I thought those three stories would be the majority of the book. But they were barely mentioned and it was so disjointed that by the time she went back to one of those people, you forgot who they were. The author failed to establish a flow that made any sense. It was almost written like stream of consciousness…let’s just get words on a page. The only part that was organized was how she ended it with the lady who wouldn’t allow an interview until Christine took her class. That at least made sense that she took the class last and then asked for the interview. I got very little out of it and couldn’t wait for it to end.
February 3, 2021
I bought this book when it came out in paperback in 2005. I started reading it then but never finished it. I picked it up again a few weeks ago. I remember the author being interviewed back then and it piqued my interest. Unfortunately, it doesn't really hold up well. The history of Lily Dale is worth noting, particularly with its connection to the Suffragist movement. However, the author's experiences as she takes New Age classes and gives and receives messages make the book weak. Her personal experiences, first as an observer and reporter and then as someone feeling a connection aren't really compelling, I'm sure they were for her. If taken as a snapshot in time (Lily Dale circa early 2000s), it is worth noting, but you could get as much if more information looking it up on the internet these days.
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