Welcome to a special BONUS episode, where I chat with an author about their nonfiction book that is morbidly curious book club adjacent, but it hasn't been a pick. Thus, a bonus episode!

I had the immense pleasure of hosting Dr. Lindsey Fitzharris at my Barnes & Noble in Mooresville, NC to promote her new book SLEUTH-HOUND: The Case of the Real Sherlock Holmes!

I recorded the event, so the audio quality isn't amazing...but I wanted to share our awesome conversation. Enjoy!

The untold story of the Edinburgh doctor who became Arthur Conan Doyle's model for Sherlock Holmes, and his adventures in the criminal underworld of Victorian Britain.

Throughout nineteenth-century Edinburgh, the surgeon Joseph Bell was known for his extraordinary talent for detection and diagnosis. To the amazement of onlookers at the Royal Infirmary, he could read a patient’s ailments, occupation, and personal habits from a single glance. Though such deductive powers were all quite “elementary” to Bell, they had a profound influence on the medical student and budding writer Arthur Conan Doyle. Soon enough, Bell’s methods helped spark the creation of fiction’s most iconic detective.

Since Sherlock Holmes first appeared in 1887, he has become a global phenomenon. Yet the man Conan Doyle credited as Sherlock's prototype has slipped into the shadows. In Sleuth-Hound, the New York Times bestselling author Lindsey Fitzharris brings Bell center stage, recounting how his work took him from ward to witness box as a medical detective probing murder and misdeeds. He worked closely and covertly with the police surgeon Henry Duncan Littlejohn and a pioneering ballistics expert named Dr. Watson, and even collaborated with Conan Doyle to overturn a homicide conviction. Bell’s forensic investigations took him from gaslit alleyways to Gilded Age drawing rooms, put him on the trail of poisoners and child killers, and even drew him into the hunt for Jack the Ripper.

By scrutinizing a scratch on a desk, a trace of cigar ash, or the slightest peculiarity of a man’s gait, Bell could turn the smallest clues into revelations. His sharp mind forever changed the way we read bodies, detect crimes, and serve justice.

Dr. Lindsey Fitzharris is a New York Times bestselling author, television host, and medical historian with a PhD from the University of Oxford. A regular contributor to The Wall Street Journal, Scientific American, The Guardian, The Lancet, and New Scientist, she is known for bringing the grisly, surprising, and deeply human history of medicine to life.

Her debut book, The Butchering Art (2017), a celebrated account of Victorian surgery, won multiple literary awards, earned international acclaim, and has been translated into 20 languages. In 2021, she hosted the Smithsonian Channel series The Curious Life and Death of…, exploring some of history’s most mysterious deaths.

Her follow-up book, The Facemaker (2022), about pioneering First World War surgeon Harold Gillies, was an instant New York Times bestseller and debuted at #4 on the Los Angeles Times bestseller list.

Welcome to a special BONUS episode, where I chat with an author about their nonfiction book that is morbidly curious book club adjacent, but it hasn't been a pick. Thus, a bonus episode!

Buy a copy of the book here!

The official memoir from paranormal investigator and Ghost Hunters TV star Steve Gonsalves!

Widely known as a lead investigator on the smash-hit TV series Ghost Hunters as well as Ghost Hunters Academy and the ratings king, Ghost Nation, Steve Gonsalves—already considered to be one of the top paranormal investigators in the world and a pioneer in the industry—showcases a collection of his most meaningful paranormal encounters from some of his favorite haunted locations.

Along with the compelling history of each site, Steve recounts his terrifying experiences with disembodied voices, haunting EVPs, mysterious dark masses, and other unexplained phenomena—in addition to what he learned about living through a life with ghosts. His beliefs and theories on the craft of paranormal investigation are told through heartwarming, hilarious, and profound stories, reflecting the fun-loving personality that has garnered him millions of fans. Filled with facts and anecdotes to add an extra level of insight—all intricately woven together to create the perfect balance of unique information and spooky fun—this is the ultimate book for paranormal enthusiasts, history buffs, and horror fans.

Steve Gonsalves has been a public speaker and educator about paranormal phenomena for more than two decades. As a main cast member of the hit television series Ghost Hunters, as well as Ghost Hunters Live, Ghost Hunters Academy, and Ghost Nation, Steve helped pave the way for a worldwide paranormal explosion. Gonsalves started his work in paranormal studies at a very young age and has investigated over 1,500 reportedly haunted locations. He had the privilege of working closely with Ed and Lorraine Warren, paranormal pioneers and the inspiration for The Conjuring movie series, as well as Dr. William G. Roll (Poltergeist). Along with his multiple appearances on a variety of television, radio, and paranormal series, Gonsalves executive produced and codirected the hit documentary films, The House in Between 1 and 2. He lives with his cat, Fleur, in Massachusetts.

Knock knock... Happy almost-Halloween babes, it's season 3 episode 10!

In October, the Morbidly Curious Book Club read Spiritualism's Place: Reformers, Seekers, and Séances in Lily Dale by Averill Earls, Sarah Handley-Cousins, Marissa C. Rhodes, and Elizabeth Garner Masarik!

Buy a copy of the book here! https://morbidlycuriousbookclub.myshopify.com/products/spiritualisms-place-reformers-seekers-and-seances-in-lily-dale

Browse our online bookstore here: https://morbidlycuriousbookclub.myshopify.com/

And thanks for being here to celebrate MCBC's 5 years! Enjoy this coupon to use in the MCBC Online Bookstore:

SPIRIT5 for $5 off!

In Spiritualism's Place, four friends and scholars who produce the acclaimed Dig: A History Podcast, share their curiosity and enthusiasm for uncovering stories from the past as they explore the history of Lily Dale. Located in western New York State, the world's largest center for Spiritualism was founded in 1879. Lily Dale has been a home for Spiritualists attempting to make contact with the dead, as well as a gathering place for reformers, a refuge for seekers looking for alternatives to established paths of knowledge, and a target for skeptics.

This intimate history of Lily Dale reveals the role that this fascinating place has played within the history of Spiritualism, as well as within the development of the women's suffrage and temperance movements, and the world of New Age religion. As an intentional community devoted to Spiritualist beliefs and practices, Lily Dale brings together multiple strands in the social and religious history of New York and the United States over the past 150 years: feminism, social reform, utopianism, new religious movements, and cultural appropriation.

Podcasters and historians alike, Averill Earls, Sarah Handley-Cousins, Elizabeth Garner Masarik, and Marissa C. Rhodes each identify one site in Lily Dale and one theme that its history illuminates. They use those sites and themes to approach Lily Dale not as debunkers but as inquisitive researchers and storytellers. At the same time, they also reflect on their own relationships contending that it's never quite possible to separate grief, hope, faith, and friendship from understandings of the past. Spiritualism's Place breaks myths, unveils unexpected stories, and finds new ways to contemplate Spiritualism's role in American history.

Averill Earls is Assistant Professor of History at St. Olaf College. She is the author of the forthcoming book, Love in the Lav, and Executive Producer of Dig: A History Podcast.

Sarah Handley-Cousins is Assistant Teaching Professor of History at the University at Buffalo. She is the author of Bodies in Blue, Executive Editor of Nursing Clio, and Producer of Dig: A History Podcast.

Elizabeth Garner Masarik is Assistant Professor of History at SUNY Brockport. She is the author of The Sentimental State and Producer of Dig: A History Podcast.

Marissa C. Rhodes is Assistant Professor of History at Saint Leo University. She is the former Managing Director of A Journal of the Plague Year and Producer of Dig: A History Podcast.

Knock knock...