'Ghosts of Athens' author's latest book dives deeper into north Georgia's haunted history
There's a reason why Tracy Adkins is holding the launch of her latest book at the Graduate Athens hotel. The local author considers the property, which includes the infamous Hoyt House, as one of the most haunted places in Athens.
Available Thursday at retailers such as Avid Bookshop and Amazon, "Ghosts of Athens and Beyond: History and Haunting of North Georgia" is Adkins' follow-up to her 2016 debut, "Ghosts of Athens." The launch party is scheduled to take place at the Graduate on Oct. 6.
The event will include a meet and greet with Adkins and a reading from the new book, and guests will have the opportunity to buy tickets for an Athens "ghost tour" by local expert Jeff Clark that will take place after the reading.
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"The chapter I'll be reading from ('Ghosts of Athens and Beyond') deals specifically with the Graduate hotel, which is one of the reasons I chose to have the book launch there," Adkins told the Banner-Herald. "There's so many stories around the property."
One of those stories is an account of spooky goings-on at the Hoyt House, a structure built in 1829 and moved from Oglethorpe County to the property in 1974 when the old brick foundry at 295 East Dougherty St. was turned into a multi-use complex that has been remodeled and renamed over time.
Adkins said that the ghost of "Mr. Hoyt," a Rev. Nathan Hoyt that the house was named after, "likes to turn people's hair dryers on and off again."
"Ghosts of Athens and Beyond" is broken up into seven sections. The first is devoted to haunted locations in Athens-Clarke County. The second has updated information on several stories from Adkins' first book. The remainder focuses on tales from Oconee, Oglethorpe, Wilkes and White counties with a final section that focuses on places in north Georgia.
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Some of the new stories include Ashford Manor, the R.E.M. steeple, the Oconee County Welcome Center and Berry College.
Adkins said that the new book came about as a result of the success of the first "Ghosts of Athens" collection, which she hadn't expected there to be much interest in.
"I didn't even do an 'About the Author' page because I thought my mom and I would read it and that was about it," said Adkins. "After it came out, people started coming forward to me with their own experiences and folks that wouldn't speak with me when I was writing it changed their minds."
At 475 pages and culled from a whopping 60 interviews, "Ghosts of Athens and Beyond" is double the size of its predecessor. Adkins said that she was able to tell which stories were more legitimate accounts of hauntings by how hesitant the people involved were to speak about what they'd seen, usually out of concern for being seen as "crazy."
When asked if she ever got the creeps while writing her books, Adkins said that the excitement of putting stories together and the work of transcribing interviews allowed for a kind of separation between she and the subject matter. Still, Adkins admitted that she does get the willies if she sits around thinking about the unexplained.
"People witness these things that totally go against the laws of physics as we understand them," said Adkins. "Ninety-nine percent of these hauntings can be explained in completely rational ways, but sometimes they just can't. It is disconcerting and it is creepy."
For complete information on the "Ghosts of Athens and Beyond" book launch and all related events, visit facebook.com/ghostsofathens/events.
This article originally appeared on Athens Banner-Herald: Come get spooked at 'Ghosts of Athens and Beyond' book signing event
