Dangerous Games People Play by Catherine Cavendish

Okay, gather round ghouls and boils! I've got a tasty treat this week for Halloween from one of my favorite horror authors, Catherine Cavendish! 

Something smells...GAMEY in here. Better roll the DIE! You think the Crypt-Keeper has a MONOPOLY on bad puns? A-hee-hee-hee-hee-heeeeeeeeee...

Here's Cat!

 

In my new story, The Darkest Veil, a group of roommates in 1973, get together to play with a primitive form of Ouija board – with devastating effects. I have had my own experiences with one and, suffice it to say, I now steer well clear.

Whether or not you believe in the supernatural or demonic forces able to cross over into or world, there is little doubt that messing about with these things can lead to psychiatric problems at the very least. The power of suggestion is strong, our upbringing, culture and beliefs can exert an overpowering influence and the results of an apparently innocent bit of fun can have life-changing consequences.

Ouija boards have enjoyed surges in popularity, particularly in times of adversity. The belief that you could communicate with dead loved ones ensured a steep rise in their use during World War I when bereaved parents and families would attend séances where a Ouija board would be used to summon the spirit of their dead loved ones.

But belief in the power of these seemingly innocent pieces of wood, covered by letters, numbers and symbols, isn’t restricted to times of conflict. In November 2014, 35 students from a school on Bolivia ended up hospitalised following a ‘cup game’ – the local term for Ouija. Whether through mass hysteria or some other cause, they exhibited similar symptoms of intense sweating, mental confusion, trance and raised pulse rates. Reports began to come in from a number of South American countries of possession by demonic spirits, mass fainting, headaches and mobility problems.

A girls’ only Catholic boarding school near Mexico City became the scene of an incident involving over five hundred pupils out of a total school population on around 4,000. Psychiatrist, Nashyiela Loa Zavala investigated the cases where symptoms included severe headaches and difficulty in walking. She found it had all started with a student called Maria who had used a Ouija board in order to determine the outcome of a school basketball match. On discovery, the girl was expelled and she was so angry at this, she reportedly cursed the school. It was then that the symptoms began to appear. Dr. Zavala’s investigation turned up strong beliefs in spirits and demons among the girls, along with a conviction that the Ouija board was a powerful means of communicating with demonic spirits. It was also widely believed that Maria’s mother was a witch. 
 

There are a number of different forms of Ouija, in addition to the board and planchette. In The Darkest Veil, the girls use a pack of Lexicon cards to spell out the letters and they handwrite words such as ‘Yes’ and ‘No’.

In 2015, social media was responsible for spreading a variation called ‘Charlie Charlie’. The only equipment needed for this game includes two pieces of paper on which the words ‘yes’ and ‘no’ are written, plus two pencils. One is placed on top of the other. The pieces of paper with the words, ‘yes’ and ‘no’ are placed one to the right and one to the left of the pencils. ‘Closed’ questions (ones to which only the answer ‘yes’ or ‘no’ is required) are posed. When/if the top pencil pivots right or left, this is interpreted as having established contact with the spirit, in the same way as a moving glass or planchette on a traditional Ouija board.

The game proved particularly popular in South America and May 2015 saw four students from Columbia admitted to hospital, screaming and babbling incoherently after playing ‘Charlie Charlie’. In the same month, knowledge of the game had spread across the Caribbean where a wave of symptoms such as fainting, trance and confusion were reported among students in St Lucia, Jamaica, Antigua and Barbuda. The following month, the Dominican Republic saw children at a primary school seemingly possessed ‘by the devil’.
 

Whatever the truth behind the claims and whatever the cause of the symptoms, sheer belief in demonic spirits undoubtedly has a profound effect.

Want to chance your luck? Don’t forget that we all have suppressed memories and influences from childhood – ones our conscious minds would dismiss as fanciful. But the minute you engage with something so steeped in ancient beliefs as a Ouija, is the moment that can trigger your unconscious self and unlock doors of your mind you didn’t even know existed.

Read about it, watch movies about it but take my advice.

Never mess with a Ouija.

We are the Thirteen and we are one

4 Yarborough Drive looked like any other late 19th century English townhouse. Alice Lorrimer feels safe and welcomed there, but soon discovers all is not as it appears to be. One of her housemates flees the house in terror. Another disappears and never returns. Then there are the sounds of a woman wailing, strange shadows and mists, and the appearance of the long-dead Josiah Underwood who founded a coven there many years earlier. The house is infested with his evil, and Alice and her friends are about to discover who the Thirteen really are.

When death's darkest veil draws over you, then shall shadows weep

The Darkest Veil is available from:

Amazon

Barnes and Noble

Kobo

About The Author

Following a varied career in sales, advertising and career guidance, Catherine Cavendish is now the full-time author of a number of paranormal, ghostly and Gothic horror novels, novellas and short stories. In addition to The Darkest Veil, Cat’s novels include The Haunting of Henderson Close, the Nemesis of the Gods trilogy - Wrath of the Ancients, Waking the Ancients and Damned by the Ancients, plus The Devil’s Serenade, The Pendle Curse and Saving Grace Devine.

Her novellas include Linden Manor, Cold Revenge, Miss Abigail’s Room, The Demons of Cambian Street, Dark Avenging Angel, The Devil Inside Her, and The Second Wife

She lives by the sea in Southport, England with her long-suffering husband, and a black cat called Serafina who has never forgotten that her species used to be worshipped in ancient Egypt. She sees no reason why that practice should not continue.

You can connect with Cat here:

 Catherine Cavendish

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