The Phantom-Terror of Spring-heeled Jack is a short eBook (25 pages) written by John Rimmer. It is part of a range under the banner of Cabinet of Curiosities in a range called UneXplaineD Rapid Reads. It takes as its topic the Victorian folklore figure (or urban myth, or…) known as Spring-heeled Jack and covers his appearances through the nineteenth century and possibly beyond.
If the figure of Spring-heeled Jack is unknown to you then this serves as a decent introduction, and even if you have some idea of the story of this supernatural figure this will fill out the edges of the myth. What it doesn’t do is answer any questions. Quite conceivably the core of the content could be gleaned by a few hours with Wikipedia and some other references.
The text is well-written but fails to do much more than present reports with small amounts of salacious prose added for effect. It doesn’t take any real set of explanations and consider how they might apply, nor does the author do more than help you pass the time and leave you curious.
Priced at £1.99 (and Amazon’s Kindle pricing may be partly to blame), this is an extravagance that is hard to justify until put in the context of the price of the coffee you might drink as you read it.
THE PHANTOM TERROR OF SPRING-HEELED JACK / AUTHOR: JOHN RIMMER / PUBLISHER: BROWN BEAR BOOKS / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW
