The Sallie House Haunting: A True Story

by Debra Lyn Pickman

This is the firsthand account of what Tony and Debra Pickman and their newborn son Taylor experienced in the now notorious Sallie House, from the day they moved in to the turn-of-the-century haunted house until they finally fled in terror. The story of the Sallie House and the fire-starting ghost girl who haunted it has sparked endless rumors and theories of murder, cover-ups, racism, and abuse. But the Pickmans know the real story because they lived it--and barely made it out alive.

Now, for the first time, Tony and Debra reveal untold stories from their ordeal. They describe Sallie's seemingly protective fascination with their baby, and tell what it was like to live with menacing entities that scratched, bit, and terrorized their family. Along with historical research, the Pickmans share personal photographs and journal entries from their time spent living in the nightmare house that still haunts them today.

Genres: Paranormal, Nonfiction, Horror, Ghosts, Supernatural, True Crime, Memoir

288 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 2010

Reviews

[Carol · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was interesting, but really only scary if you were reading it on a dark night while alone in your house...but it was interesting. It doesn't really matter if you believe in ghost or not... if this is really happening, then there was at least one very active presence. I wish it had been written to voice Debra and Tony's experiences instead of just what Tony had experienced and his thoughts at the end. Also, the book said there were pictures but there were only two not very clear pictures in the entire book. I found a few...actually a very few, interesting comments about the house from people who had visited it that will share. I believe a lot of it was things these folks who had forked over a great deal of money to "investigate" or just to visit, brought in their own imaginations, hoping to find something to be true. "We walked in the door to a heavy feeling. We immediately went to open the basement door, where most of the activity seems to stem from. We hear footsteps going up the stairs above, but no one but us was in the house and we were all in the kitchen. From there it was a parade of shadows, equipment going off, voices, you name it." Then there are many more comments from people that saw it as an overpriced supposedly haunted "Disney World". The Sallie House was a huge disappointment. The main concern was people coming up and knocking on the doors and windows asking to come inside, or just popping up in a window and taking photos. There are not many blinds or curtains in the house. The house is on a busy street so all you see are car lights going around the rooms. In summer you will have the old AC unit making noise. We did not get any sense of anything out of place and was not scared nor did we have any strange feelings anywhere in the house. I honestly would recommend you NOT waste your money. The history of this house does not show at any time there being a little girl called "Sallie" in the house much less dying in the house. . It's a good Halloween story...but is it true? Who knows? As my Irish grandmother used to tell us as kids when we scared ourselves silly reading ghost stories..."I'm not sure if there are ghosts but I'm not looking to invite one to tea".

[Carrie (The Butterfly Reader) · Rating 1 out of 5]

I don't rate one star often but this was just boring! I saw so many people saying it was creepy and should be read with the lights on but I fell asleep twice while trying to read it! Twice!

[Caroline Mitchell · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was drawn to this book in a search for answers, due to experiencing paranormal events in my home. Debra documents this case well, and I read this book in a couple of days as I could not put it down. There are lots of twists and turns, and I without spoiling the story, I totally understand why Debra felt the need to trust the ghost and try to live with it. Unless you have experienced such a thing, that aspect is hard for most to understand.
However human nature makes us want to believe the best in people (and ghosts!) and that they don't really want to harm us or are misunderstood. Unfortunately we can never tell with such things as their behaviour is so erratic, luring you in one day, then terrifying you the next. I note previous reviewers have said they would have liked more closure, but writing non fiction is incredibly difficult, and you have to be honest to the story. This is something I also encountered. I also note the book could do with some proofreading, but this does not detract from the story and is down to the publishers who should have given it a final polish, rather than Debra, as given this is her first book, she has done well to put it all together and document such a heartfelt account. I would love to see a follow up book to this story. I would also like to add that when our paranormal problems began I contacted Debra for advice, and she was very genuine and thoughtful. I believe her story and recommend it to others interested in true paranormal.

[Jordan B · Rating 4 out of 5]

A little over a year ago, I listened to the Astonishing Legends podcast about the Sallie House and convinced my paranormal investigative team to go. It was a fascinating experience, one I hope to try again in the future. It was really interesting to hear more about what the Pickman's experienced as described by Debra. The gulf in the experiences between the two of them is really interesting as well as the potential psychological factors involved. It is a little frustrating how often this book mentions photographs they took and drawings they made but then do not provide them (while providing other photographs at different times). Also sometimes it seems as though Debra is unclear on how she feels about the experience as a whole, or maybe she just isn't very good at conveying that in her writing. Overall, this was a really interesting and creepy book. Highly recommend for those interested in the supernatural.

[Carol D · Rating 4 out of 5]

Intriguing book. This came out before all of the Ghost Hunting shows came on to network and cable TV. This book told the true story of a family that thought they only had one little girl ghost living with them, when it turned out that they had another darker energy there as well.

I noticed that this edition was missing several words throughout the text or that the words were switched around. So I found myself adding words so it made sense, maybe this is the real meaning of ghost writing.

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

I remember watching the Sightings updates on this haunting back in the 90s and found it to be one of the most disturbing paranormal cases I had ever heard of. It remains that to this day and the book takes you right into the middle of one family's mounting terror. I absolutely could not read this at night!

[Jo Ann · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not scary, just wack-o.

Honestly, I'm not sure how this haunting became so famous. I've read much creepier stuff on the internet. Don't waste your time.

[Sanfordgrant · Rating 4 out of 5]

This felt like a true account of what they went through. I like the conclusions the author draws from her experience.

[Kristyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was interesting, but not scary. It was interesting to read about the progression of the spirit(s) in the house. If this stuff really happened, there was at least one very active presence. I wish it had been written in a way that melded Debra and Tony's experiences instead of just tacking on what Tony really experienced and thought at the end. I also wish more of the photos had been included in the book since it talked about taking a lot that showed things. The ending seemed very rushed and I don't understand why the aftermath was mentioned and then left unexplained. I'm probably going to track down the television episodes about this case and do some more research, but the book is a decent introduction to the case.

[Kennedy Keown · Rating 2 out of 5]

Eh.
I generally don’t like nonfiction, but I took a shot with this because I love horror and paranormal stuff.
But this was just kinda boring?
Like if this family was actually haunted then shame on me, but eh. I find fictional stories and novels more terrifying than what they described in their experiences.
Not my cup of tea.

[Al-hora · Rating 5 out of 5]

I bought this book to read on my holidays. I became so engrossed with the story that I had actually completed it in 2 days (well, it was raining so no point site-seeing - lol)

I liked the honest approach of the authors concerning 'Sallie', which was written in the first tense. There was no pretence that they knew what it was, only that they did not fear it rather embraced the idea of having a 'spirit child' amongst them.

The writing style was clear and simple, refraining from flowering up the plot, or sensationalism. Yes, there were a few editorial blunders such as confusion over which year they were talking about that had me scratching my head a bit. But by no means was this book the worst I've ever read in the spelling or grammatical error department. Any errors certainly did not detract from the story.

The story starts when the couple move into the house. Problems seemed to manifest itself with the birth of their son. Something in the house did not seem to like the idea of a baby around, and I don't believe it was `Sallie', rather it was more akin to another entity residing there, which was far more sinister.

The idea of being able to communicate with `Sallie' - or even wanting to for that matter - was certainly unusual. One side of me embraced that idea but I did find myself worrying for Debra because, despite her curiosity, she really did not appear to have any clue on how to protect herself from psychic attack. That is when this kind of thing becomes a dangerous game.

I would have liked to have seen more of the husbands experiences entwined within the story rather than just a short note at the end. It was curious why the author did not do that - baring in mind that whilst Debra was conversing with `Sallie' her husband was getting all kinds of demonic interaction from another entity.

It is also a shame that there was never any real closure on this story. After a number of visits from paranormal investigators and the TV program, the family simply packed their bags and left, leaving the nastiness behind for someone else to deal with. Why the local priest was never called in, nor even considered as far as I can tell, was beyond me. The Shaman lady did her best but I'm not convinced she had much of a clue as to what she was dealing with either.

On the whole this was a good book to read and I would recommend it based on its honesty, even if naivety as to the dangers of the spirit realms was prominent.

[Reuxbot · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book just made me feel like the entire haunting was a prank Tony and his brother started and then let get out of hand. My take is that Tony was very insecure and old fashioned and his wife was quite strong and self sufficient and the "haunting" gave Tony a way to lash out in a passive aggressive way at Debra. His intense paranoia over the TV show was suspicious at best.

Then there were the cats.. Tony killed two cats. As horrible as it is, doesn't that in itself seem strange? Apparently one was the demon's fault, and the other was an accident.

Tony admitted that when he was possessed he saw killing the cat as a way to hurt his wife because she loved cats. If I'm to believe Sallie was a demon, why would she try to warn Tony about the cat in the dryer? Isn't the thought that your husband is so careless that he not only locks your cat in the dryer, but doesn't even check on the noise enough to sow discord? I also have trouble believing a cat in a dryer full of clothes sounds like shoes. But that's something I don't want to dwell on because it's just so damn horrible. Maybe Tony was lying about the second cat to make Debra feel bad for not leaving when he asked? Who knows.


I also found there were some inconsistencies in the story (for example; they adopted the cats out but then had cats again with no explanation), then Pickman does a complete 180 on the entire thing. Apparently Tony had been suffering, yet his behaviour throughout her story wasn't consistent with that. Was she just completely oblivious, or is he a liar? Or maybe they both are.

I don't know what went on there, and I doubt even the author does. But The Sallie House Haunting.. was interesting enough for a Halloween read so I'll leave it at that.

[Lisa Cindrich]

Naturally, when I got to go inside the infamous house, nothing happened. I swear I am the anti-psychic. Ghosts flee from my presence.

Update:
I really have no idea how to rate this since I was reading it purely for "insider" information. I enjoyed having an actual Sallie House resident's detailing of events. The only problem was that, after giving us lots of detail based on her journals, towards the end of the book the telling got very rushed and vague. The Pickmans moved out and then more episodes occurred, but we don't really learn much of anything about them. The main focus in the final pages seems to be on the strong love between Debra and her husband and how that is what allowed them to make it through all paranormal difficulties. I don't really understand why the book went from loads of detail to none at all.

[Eden Silverfox · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Sallie House has been featured on such shows as Sightings and A Haunting. There was even a movie, Heartland Ghost, made about the house.

Written by Debra Pickman, a former resident, is filled with information about the history of the house and details the paranormal happenings that occurred while she lived there with her family.

I didn't feel it was a scary read but not much scares me. I just kept wondering how the author didn't right away know it was something demonic. Not even the psychic knew. How could the psychic not know? The scratches that were happening to her husband should have alerted her right off the bat.

When the scratches were first mentioned in the book, I know whatever was there wasn't a little girl.

It was an interesting read. Those who like true paranormal stories will enjoy this book.

[Kimberly Robello · Rating 4 out of 5]

A quick read. It was very entertaining and interesting. I'm used to hearing scary stories, so it wasn't scary to me, but it might be scary to other people. It's an extremely haunted house with a lot of activity within days and weeks of each other. The show Sightings featured them a few times. I was surprised to hear this because I remember seeing that show when I was a kid. To this day I remember seeing the scratches form on Tony's body as the camera was rolling. The burnt rose on the windowsill also made an impression on me because I remember that as well. Those two things scared me the most from that show because I don't remember much else that went on besides something happening with a teddy bear.

The Sallie House was touted as the most haunted house in America.

[Marilyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you like spooky stories written by those who experience them, then you'll like this. Interesting, creepy, and entertaining...open for you to choose to believe, or not. I've read several of these types of books and this one was pretty good. The story was going along great until the last chapter and then the epilogue when the author introduced events that weren't included in the previous chapters and I found that confusing. Also, the story had an unsatifying ending.

[Ella · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love how she actually talked about the activity and mentioned that she wrote the book to help others who have experienced the supernatural. I was sad to learn that they think Sallie had been a demonic energy all along :(

[Beth · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was not well-written and there are only 2 of the photos included. Experiences were somewhat interesting but not overally presented well.

[Kat Wilcox · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m rating this book 4.5 stars:

While I originally wanted to rate it 5, there was definitely some punctuation and grammatical errors that bothered me quite a bit. If this wasn’t proofread, it definitely should have been. The ending also did feel very rushed unlike the rest of the story. I actually visited The Sallie House last month & I don’t doubt that place is haunted whatsoever to this day even based on my (seemingly insignificant compared to Debra’s) experience. I was not at all expecting the ending and Debra really did do wonderful on how she decided to go about writing this. She wrote it based from journal entries throughout the span of her time there where the paranormal activity appeared innocent. It wasn’t until close to the end of the book that you start to see a turn with negativity. By the very end, I was absolutely astonished and did not see some of the things that happened coming like the possessions, dead cat 2 scenario, or the m*rder plan in detail. I was somehow even more shocked to read that the author & her husband never divorced. This whole story is intriguing to me even after having visited the house myself. What’s interesting is I picked up this book after going and leaving a Care Bear (a teddy bear of all things?!) and truly did not know much of the story at all- but after reading it and visually seeing the home layout myself as well, this was a huge page-turner for me. While I never have believed in demons before, this book has actually made me take a step back and think about it more.

All around, this was a great book that was very exciting and worth the read despite the lack of proofreading and seemingly rushed ending.

[Lee · Rating 3 out of 5]

A low 3 stars from me.

The book was entertaining enough but it seemed to just move from one thing to the next without much feeling, the writing was almost completely emotionless, and it repeated things time and time again, for example, everyone has come to accept that the house is haunted, no one is questioning that however everytime something happens the author says things like "we all looked around to see if someone was playing a prank" or "when the lights went off we realized that no one was standing by the switch so we knew that no one in the room could have turned the light out" it got repetitive and quite annoying at times.

Aside from the writing, you have to question the authors decisions, this is supposed to be a true haunting yet they were happy to stay in a house where ghosts were supposedly attacking her husband and often leaving him bloodied, now this in itself would be enough to raise alarm bells and get anyone heading towards the hills and putting as much distance between themselves and the house as possible, add into the fact that there was a newborn child in the house as well and I just find it unbelievable that they didn't put the safety of their child first...oh it wasn't just attacking the husband there were several occasions where fires were also started as well.

If I seem like I am being overly critical of the book I apologize, I did enjoy it but there were just one too many eye rolling moments in there for me to take it completely seriously.

[Shannon Simmer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Book was good. I investigated the house with my friend two weeks ago and live streamed it all on our page S&S Paranormal. We will be going back. This book is not mean to be a paranormal thriller. It’s Debra recounting their experiences no matter how small. It isn’t beefed up to be more enticing. If you’re wanting to read it to hear of their experiences then great but don’t read it if you’re wanting a book to scare you.
I enjoyed reading about their experiences. Though I am skeptical of some things as a whole (nothing Debra said) I am eager to go back and see if I can recreate the things Debra and her husband experienced. I do believe over the years with all of the people coming to the house that whatever was there could’ve been cleared out and what’s there now are just things others have brought in from their seances and other things but I am excited to use the book to rest the spirits in the house again. There is definitely something there now, but is it what was there 20 years ago? I am skeptical of that.

[Silk Senses · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was fascinating witnessing how manipulative demons are!

Since the start I knew it was demonic & I believe its better if u guys knew that before starting the book as it was interesting to see how manipulative demons are & how they made the author feel like they were an innocent little girl!!! I could almost see them in the corner laughing at her while she got gifts & cared for Sallie. We also didn’t really need to know every little activity the ghosts did, it made the book long & boring. If u got bored, jusr skip to the end & read the husband point of view & it will all make sense. Demons have a ton of patience & they work really slow but incredibly powerful! Be careful guys!

[Samantha · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was pretty disappointed with this book, to be honest. The Sallie house has been something that has scared me for a long time. Anytime it is on a paranormal show I typically shut it off because it disturbs me, which is unusual considering other things I subject myself to lol. However, this book did not deliver. It was extremely repetitive and I found it difficult to finish. I understand the turmoil their family went through, but I feel it would have been better from Tony’s point of view since he was the individual who experienced the worst of the phenomenon. I’m not upset that I took the time to read it, but if you’re looking to be scared.... this book isn’t the one for you.

[Starry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Intriguing

I chose this book because I love a good haunting - I don’t mind whether it’s fiction or non fiction as long as it is riveting. When I started I had my doubts the introduction is dry and business like to the point of being dull and I was worried I was in for a disappointing read. Don’t worry, the body of the story is nothing like that it has suspense, pace, and chills galore. Would you trust an unknown spirit because it appeared to be a virtual orphan with a cutesy name or would you have hightailed it ASAP? Who or what is Sallie?

[James McIntosh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Innocent or Demonic

Thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. It allows you an inside look while being safely on the outside. From the onset of this young families experiences within the Sallie House I found myself chanting 'Get Out!' for nothing good can come of this place. Strange how the mind works and how excuses are born. One experiencing innocence and another experiencing wickedness. Although this family will be forever changed they have found freedom from evil for the time being.

[Kimberly Ogden · Rating 5 out of 5]

I could not put this book down!!! I met Tony Pickman at a ghost hunt and had the opportunity to talk with him and ask some questions about the house. Debra is an awesome writer and she was able to pull me right into that house while reading this book. This couple lived through this and it's truly amazing what all they endured. Read this book if you are interested in paranormal. It's a true story that will make you think twice about the other side.

[Ronald Lloveras · Rating 4 out of 5]

Most books I've read related to ghostly encounters are based on stories told and described to writers or researchers. It was a good read to hear of the instances from the people who actually experienced the encounters. Since this was based on journals, some things were disconnected within the timelines. The ending was left wide open. Found out there were some documentaries on this house so I'm sure to watch them to get some clearance on some things. Still an enjoyable read.

[Amanda · Rating 3 out of 5]

Anecdotal and Halfway Decent

Mrs. Pickman is surely no Joan Dideon when it comes to writing, but her prose is serviceable. As an atheist, I don’t automatically believe paranormal claims, but I don’t dismiss them either. My understanding of physics and neuroscience lead me towards critical thinking in regards to this kind of phenomena. What Deb describes in this book is spooky for sure, and that’s good enough for me. I wasn’t enlightened, but I was sure as all heck interested.

[Melissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Obsessed with Sallie House

I remember seeing Sightings as a kid. I was already into the paranormal books and tv shows so when this came out as a true haunting, I was very interested. The hour long broadcasts were never long enough for me and I always wondered what happened after the show. This book answers that and more.

[Rosie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow

An amazing story.....Really keeps you interested in the story. Love the wait it was told..it answered any questions about an event in the book at the time, many times even before the event itself....great format..It has that ring of truth we all recognize but isn't always in the books /movies involving the paranormal..Would certainly recommend it..