More proof humans were here over 130,000 years ago? Additional testing has added weight to the evidence there were human Mastodon Hunters on the West Coast of North America around 110,000 B.C., though many in archaeology and anthropology remain unconvinced. Then again, the Cerutti Mastodon Site in San Diego, California — and its dating — have been controversial since its discovery was announced just over three years ago.

What they discovered and documented are the remains left by human scavengers who picked apart a Mastodon carcass, and broke open its bones to get to the marrow. One of the mastodon’s tusks was even stuck vertically into the ground, as if to mark the spot. Bones which defy breaking by natural elements were shattered, and piled around the site. …

I’m inside the dome-shaped interior of a beehive stone chamber. Optical luminescence dating (OSL) places its time of construction at around 1200 to 1500 AD, 500 to 800 years ago.

Maybe I’m seeing things.

Fifteen years ago this week, I self-published my first novel, the near-future science fiction adventure VATICAN ASSASSIN. My life would never be the same.

I’d start podcasting it the following September, stumbling into the nascent worlds of podcasting and podcast fiction, and end up on panels at my first Science Fiction convention the summer after. My podcast book then joined others at a new site I’d learned about at the con, Podiobooks.com. From there, things really took off.

I’m celebrating the original publication by releasing a brand-new edition of VATICAN ASSASSIN, with stunning new cover art and a new audiobook version featuring amazing Voice Cameos from some legendary podcasters, authors and voice actors. …

A history-making discovery? Walking across the wetlands on the boardwalk towards Raven Ridge in Monkton, Vermont, I had no idea what I was about to find. My plan was a short hike. The discoveries made were entirely unexpected.

Earlier this summer, I met up with author Joe Citro on the steps of the library on the green in Woodstock, Vermont.

“Did you know there’s a vampire’s heart buried under the Woodstock Green?” he asked.

Of course there is. And — of course — Joe Citro knows the story.

Suspense and horror author and folklorist, Citro — whether he knows, or would admit it — is a Vermont treasure. His shared encyclopedic knowledge of ghosts, haunts, unexplained events, mysterious locations and just plain weird Vermont has now filled several volumes, such as Green Mountain Ghosts, Ghouls & Unsolved Mysteries, Vermont’s Haunts: Tall Tales & True from the Green Mountains, Joe Citro’s Vermont Odditorium and more. …

By riverbanks. On mountainsides. In swamps. Facing the rising sun on the Winter Solstice, or aligned with the cardinal points of the compass, or the Equinox, or perhaps even the setting of the Pleiades… There are mysterious stone workings all over New England and upstate New York. And there are nearly as many origin theories for them as there are enigmatic stone chambers.

Stage magic involves sleight-of-hand and misdirection — look over here, while I do this over there. Theirs is a game of theatricality in appearance as well — the Magician looks the part, in robes, or a stage costume, or — more likely these days — in leather and tattoos. Their magic is a Production, with a capital “P” — designed to impress, and create a perception of the impossible achieved, to create awe.

That is a Show.

That is not how real Magic — or, if you prefer, “Magick”, per Aleister Crowley — actually works.

But even Crowley and his followers were limited by the occult trappings and esoterica with which their fine de siècle frameworks burdened their interpretations. One need only do a quick image search on old Aleister to find him glaring at the camera in his pyramid hat and robes. …