Horror Review - Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid: The Book of Scary Urban Legends (2004, Jan Harold Brunvand)

In 1981, professional folklorist Jan Harold Brunvand compiled The Vanishing Hitchhiker, a 20th century look at the tales and oral traditions passed along by tellers convinced they actually happened to somebody, just never someone that anyone can actually identify by name. There's even an acronym for these types of tales now: FOAF, or Friend of a Friend, because the incident never happened to the person telling the story, and it didn't happen to anyone they actually knew, they were told about it by a friend because it happened to a friend of one of their friends.

In other words, FOAF is just another term for 'bullshit'.

What's amazing about these tales is not only their iron-clad resistance to being debunked, but also their ability to roam across the country from one township to the next, crossing fields, mountains, valleys, even oceans and continents. These FOAF-tales, like some demented orally-transmitted incarnation of Jason Voorhees, stalk campfire tales and gatherings of friends, office buildings and shopping malls, backyard barbecues and e-mail messages. Chances are you've been infected by one or two yourself, and you probably didn't even realize it. I mean, everybody knows somebody who told them about the hook-handed killer stalking lover's lane. They made a movie about it in 2000, after all.

The iconic story of the babysitter who keeps receiving creepy phone calls asking her if she's checked on the children lately has to be true, right? They made a movie out of it in 1979. And a sequel in 1993. And a reboot in 2006!

How about those thieves who go around harvesting kidneys and other body parts for the black market?

The story of "Bloody Mary" has been adapted to the screen so many times, both for film and TV, that you'd be harder-pressed to find someone in North America who didn't know what happened if you started into the mirror in your bathroom with the lights out and said her name three (or was that five, or ten, or fifty?) times. And let's not even get into the film Urban Legend, which uses everything from "The Killer in the Back Seat" and "The Roommate's Death" to "The Boyfriend's Death" and what happens if you eat Pop Rocks and chug a Coke to startle the audience and slaughter its college kid cast. These are stories so ubiquitous and well-known that chances are good you could repeat them, or at least compose your own extemporaneous versions, the minute anyone asked.

The kicker is, they're all stories, and while some of them may have a kernel of truth, the fictional tale spun by people desperate to shock, delight, or scare audiences usually bears little resemblance to the facts when subject to a firm dissection. That's what Brunvand does here with Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid.

Without Brunvand's scholarship, this is just a loose collection of spooky stories to recite at the next sleepover. But rather than stripping these stories of their power, Brunvand's goal is to enhance the fun for everyone by showing how these stories evolve and change over time, passing from person to person, culture to culture, decade to decade, even century to century. If you like a healthy dose of humor and scholarship to go with your tales of mayhem and destruction, Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid is an inexpensive and fun way to explore the world of urban legends from the safety of your own bedroom.

Of course, even your own bedroom isn't truly free of danger. After all, you remember what happened to that girl when the black widow spider wound up in her pillowcase, don't you?

Four stifled yelps of amusement and fear out of five.

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Best Scene:

Well, it's a book of folklore so you can't exactly pull a 'best scene' out of it, but of all the tales presented in it, here's one I find the most hilariously awful even now, some twenty-five years after I first encountered it myself:

An older couple took a long-anticipated trip to Costa Rica, and when they arrived they found to their dismay their luggage had been stolen. The thieves had spared nothing except the couple's toilet articles and their camera case. It was assumed that the thieves didn't want the couple's personal toilet items, and authorities speculated that in their haste and loaded down with other luggage the miscreants simply were unable to manage the camera equipment.

Well, the couple were determined not to let the incident ruin their vacation. They bought some new clothes and in fact had quite an enjoyable two weeks. They took a lot of pictures.

Upon returning home they promptly had their film developed so they could share the experience with their friends. Having shot color slides, they quickly loaded them into a Carousel projector and began showing them to their kids. Halfway through the presentation they ran across a slide they didn't take. It must, in fact, have been taken by the thieves who stole their luggage.

It was a close-up picture of the couple's toothbrushes stucking out of two large hairy butts.

Now try to enjoy your next international vacation. Remember, it's only a story. ;)