Lure of the Sinister

Lure of the Sinister
Author: Gareth Medway
Publisher: NYU Press
Total Pages: 475
Release: 2001-04
Genre: History
ISBN: 081475645X

A frequent writer on comparative religion and the history of occultism, Medway begins by exploring what a Satanist is and why people worship Satan, then looks at such topics as the history of Satan and the Pact, Satanic crime, hell on earth, sex slaves of Lucifer, and the relationship between paranoia and conspiracy. He explains that as a Pagan he does not believe in Satan, but neither does he believe in Christianity but knows Christians are real. Annotation copyrighted by Book News Inc., Portland, OR

Pranksters

Pranksters
Author: Kembrew McLeod
Publisher: NYU Press
Total Pages: 368
Release: 2014-04
Genre: History
ISBN: 081479629X

Profiles the most notorious mischief makers in Western culture from 1600 to the present day and explores how pranks are part of a long tradition of speaking truth to power and social critique.

The Re-Enchantment of the West, Vol 2

The Re-Enchantment of the West, Vol 2
Author: Christopher Partridge
Publisher: A&C Black
Total Pages: 481
Release: 2006-06-20
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0567041239

Challenging some assessments of religion in the West, this study argues that, although much organized religion, particularly Christianity, is in numerical decline, in actual fact we are witnessing an alternative spiritual re-enchantment of society and culture.

Children of Lucifer

Children of Lucifer
Author: Ruben van Luijk
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 633
Release: 2016-05-02
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0190275111

If we are to believe sensationalist media coverage, Satanism is, at its most benign, the purview of people who dress in black, adorn themselves with skull and pentagram paraphernalia, and listen to heavy metal. At its most sinister, its adherents are worshippers of evil incarnate and engage in violent and perverse secret rituals, the details of which mainstream society imagines with a fascination verging on the obscene. Children of Lucifer debunks these facile characterizations by exploring the historical origins of modern Satanism. Ruben van Luijk traces the movement's development from a concept invented by a Christian church eager to demonize its internal and external competitors to a positive (anti-)religious identity embraced by various groups in the modern West. Van Luijk offers a comprehensive intellectual history of this long and unpredictable trajectory. This story involves Romantic poets, radical anarchists, eccentric esotericists, Decadent writers, and schismatic exorcists, among others, and culminates in the establishment of the Church of Satan by carnival entertainer Anton Szandor LaVey. Yet it is more than a collection of colorful characters and unlikely historical episodes. The emergence of new attitudes toward Satan proves to be intimately linked to the ideological struggle for emancipation that transformed the West and is epitomized by the American and French Revolutions. It is also closely connected to secularization, that other exceptional historical process which saw Western culture spontaneously renounce its traditional gods and enter into a self-imposed state of religious indecision. Children of Lucifer makes the case that the emergence of Satanism presents a shadow history of the evolution of modern civilization as we know it. Offering the most comprehensive account of this history yet written, van Luijk proves that, in the case of Satanism, the facts are much more interesting than the fiction.

The Lure of the Sea

The Lure of the Sea
Author: Alain Corbin
Publisher: Univ of California Press
Total Pages: 424
Release: 1994-01-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780520066380

Corbin argues that with few exceptions people living before the eighteenth century knew nothing of the attractions of the coast, the visual delight of the sea, the desire to brave the force of the waves or to feel the coolness of sand against the skin. The image of the ocean in the popular consciousness was coloured by Biblical and mythical recollections of sea monsters, voracious whales, and catastrophic floods. It was perceived as sinister and unchanging, a dark, unfathomable force inspiring horror rather than attraction. These associations of catastrophe and fear in the minds of Europeans intensified the repulsion they felt towards deserted and dismal shores.

Satanism

Satanism
Author: Faxneld
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 361
Release: 2023
Genre: Education
ISBN: 0199913536

Satanism is a phenomenon that has existed as a prominent trope since very beginning of Christianity, when the Church Fathers entertained fantasies about people worshipping the Devil and indulging in macabre rituals. In the early modern period, similarly unfounded ideas led to the infamous witch trials which transpired primarily between 1400 and 1700. In the 1980s and 1990s, what has been labelled a "Satanic Panic" swept the United States and parts of Europe, with again, unfounded rumors about secret Satanist networks committing gruesome murders, kidnappings and ritualistic child abuse. Today, the so called Pizzagate and QAnon conspiracy theories in the United States again draw on these motifs, this time postulating that left-wing Satanists are secretly manipulating politics and doing nefarious deeds in the shadows. This book, however, is only indirectly concerned with the purely fictional Satanism of such paranoid fantasies. It does not deal directly with the literary tradition of Satanism either, where Satanists can appear as antagonists (or, more rarely, protagonists) in the plot of a story, or authors express Satanic sympathies in a poem or two. Rather, our selection of source texts focuses on actual, existing Satanic groups, and thinkers of importance to the emergence of a Satanic milieu that forms part of a broader landscape of alternative religion. Some of the texts do in a sense belong to the above-mentioned categories, e.g., Léo Taxil's spoof on conspiracy theories, or the quite literary pseudo-histories of Satanism - in fact Satanic tracts in disguise of Jules Michelet and Stanislaw Przybyszewski, but we have aimed to concentrate on 1. self-designated Satanic groups and ideologists, 2. groups and ideologists who prominently revere a figure they identify with Satan, even though they may not self-designate as Satanists, and 3. groups and ideologists mostly excluding, however, literary texts and conspiracy theories whose re-interpretations of Satan were crucial to the growth of such ideas--

Shattered Skull

Shattered Skull
Author: Tabatha Vargo
Publisher: Tabatha Vargo
Total Pages: 710
Release: 2020-02-21
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0986117382

The first time I saw Skull, he was standing atop a speeding motorcycle. The second time, he was putting his fist through my brother’s face. Now he’s everywhere I look. He’s making my life hell with his vulgar remarks and seductive lure, but it’s not my fault my brother joined The Border Lords, his rival crew. I keep my nose out of their business and my head in the books, yet he’s always there provoking me. Dragging me into their conflict. Everyone in town knows you don’t mess with the Sons of Sinister, but no one ever told me what do when a Son of Sinister messes with me. New York Times bestselling author Tabatha Vargo invites you to fall in love with the Sons of Sinister! A new adult spin on MC books with all the grunge, angst, and dirty, foul-mouthed biker boys who know how to handle curves. The Sons of Sinister consists of four standalone novels. Shattered Skull, Dirty Saint, Ruthless Crow, & Joker’s Wild. This series is the Blow Hole Boys meets crotch rockets meets naughty, bully bastards who don’t give a f*ck and the good girls who can’t help but fall for them! They run the streets, the money, and can outride any other crew on the streets.

It Came From the 1950s!

It Came From the 1950s!
Author: Darryl Jones
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 277
Release: 2011-10-04
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0230337236

An eclectic and insightful collection of essays predicated on the hypothesis that popular cultural documents provide unique insights into the concerns, anxieties and desires of their times. 1950s popular culture is analysed by leading scholars and critics such as Christopher Frayling, Mark Jancovich, Kim Newman and David J. Skal.

Blood Lure

Blood Lure
Author: Nevada Barr
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 352
Release: 2002-02-05
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 9780425183755

In this mystery in Nevada Barr’s New York Times bestselling series, District Park Ranger Anna Pigeon is betrayed by nature itself, as a most unnatural evil stalks its prey in the pristine West… Straddling the border between Montana and Canada lies the Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park—Anna’s home away from home when she is sent on a cross-training assignment to study grizzly bears. Along with bear researcher Joan Rand and a volatile, unpredictable teenage boy, Anna hikes the back country, seeking signs of bear. But the tables are turned on their second night out, when one of the beasts comes looking for them. Daybreak finds the boy missing, a camper mutilated, and Anna caught in a grip of fear, painfully aware that her lifelong bond with nature has inexplicably snapped...

Don't Make Me Go Back, Mommy

Don't Make Me Go Back, Mommy
Author: Doris Sanford
Publisher: Multnomah
Total Pages: 0
Release: 1990
Genre: Ritual abuse victims
ISBN: 9780880703673

Five-year-old Allison is one of a group of children who are abused and subjected to horrible rituals at a perverse day care center, but with therapy and her parents' love she begins the healing process.