By Andrew Boyd
Marshall Pickering. 250 pages. £7.99
ISBN 0 00 627811 6
This disconcerting and haunting book is not a compulsive read - the information it offers is too unpleasant for that. The stories in it, offered as anecdotal evidence for the heavy involvement of the new generation in all forms of the occult, could I suppose be found elsewhere. However, the setting of this information is unusual. Although the writer professes holding to conventional, standard Christian teaching, he expresses opinions held by teachers, parents and social workers from a broad belief base. This is, in my opinion, a strength of the book.
Dangerous Obsessions sets its own demanding agenda. It says: 'No book could provide definitive proof that occult practices do or do not work. What matters to us is whether the attempt to find out can be harmful to young, impressionable people.' It then sets this list of questions:
