The unexplained ; a sourcebook of unusual natural phenomena

by William R. Corliss

Documented--mysterious riddles of the universe science cannot solve!A searching look at hundreds of baffling facts that defy explanation. Vulcan, the planet that vanishedLunar Light flashesThe Mexican MessiahAncient waterworks in FloridaAn Alpine specter that lures climbers to their deaths

Genres: Science, Nonfiction

338 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1976

About the author

William Roger Corliss was an American physicist and writer who was known for his interest in collecting data regarding anomalous phenomena.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William...

Reviews

[Shawn · Rating 4 out of 5]

What's interesting about looking back at these paranormal books is the wide range of author types. Sure, you've got your charlatans and hucksters, your true believers and your reductionist skeptics. But you also get guys like William R. Corliss, a physicist, who pretty much focused his interests on the "anomalous" instead of the "paranormal" - by which I mean he was interested in cataloging strange natural phenomena which were unexplained (but not impossible) by current science.

So, that's one aspect of what you get here - lots of strange lights, sky phenomena, optical illusions, mirages. Also, perennial oddities like frogs & fish raining from the sky, strange megalithic structures in the U.S. and various geological anomalies. The other cool thing is that Corliss, having a more scientific bent, tends to source his reports from science and nature journals of the time, and gives you the actual original reports and articles. So reading about excavating frozen mammoths or strange ball lightning reports takes on a more immediate, and more clinical, approach than some Frank Edwards compendium of nonsense.

I just cherry-picked a few of my favorites to look at again. The "lost planet" of Vulcan and Venus' missing moon, Earthquake Lights, Underwater Light Wheels, strange audio anomalies called "water guns", Dark Days (which Corliss admits are probably the most "explainable" of the "unexplained" events here) and Star Jelly all get a nice look in. Some really fascinating stuff here.

[TrumanCoyote · Rating 3 out of 5]

All rather intriguing. But inevitably a source book of such stuff will largely consist of minute descriptions of things, without any of it seeming to add up to much (from the Big Picture perspective).