Power Of Place – The Forest Dark

2026/02/272026/02/27

Is The Forest Dark The Real Forest Behind The Trees?

An outstanding novel as a model

Fiona Barnett’s excellent novel “The Dark Between the Trees” presents a fascinating idea within a compelling modern story of Forest Horror.

A doomed expedition gets caught in a mysterious, otherworldly forest that is superimposed over the normal forest they enter at the beginning of the story. A huge oak tree disappears overnight, and another realm breaks into the ordinary reality with flickering and shimmering perceptions that appear like hallucinations in the first place and then become a brutal reality.

It’s a fascinating concept since it gives the well-known ideas of the power of places and the zones of the supernatural a new dimension.

The book, which stands in the best tradition of Algernon Blackwood and Arthur Machen, shows convincingly how a hidden dimension breaks through the fabric of normal reality:

“There were two forests, and one of them kept flickering into sight – not even on the edge of her vision now – but sometimes right in the middle of it.” (From Fiona Barnett’s book)

Even though it is fiction, it provides a promising premise for real investigations into the unknown.

The zones of the paranormal

The otherworld as an (normally) invisible landscape behind the ordinary makes sense: If we go through the different phenomena of the supernatural, from mysterious light orbs, UFOs, to ghostly apparitions, the lowest common denominator is location:

Again and again, it is certain hotspots: notorious haunted forests, zones where Ufos are seen, bewitched fields – landscapes where things happen.

Local legends and witness accounts “draw” maps over time: There are clusters of mysterious disappearances or places where “lights” are seen more often: Hessdalen in Norway is a prominent place, or the Brown Mountain Lights in the US. Somehow, the otherworldly “landscape” is connected to our landscape. Or is it vice versa? Are our landscapes the “normal”, “visible” part of a larger unknown dimension?

These unknown dimensions might manifest in many ways, and it is the dark forest behind the visible world. It is the layer between the trees. A layer where orbs, beasts, and ghostly apparitions can occur. At night. Mostly. And it is indeed, like in the novel, the impression that something gets superimposed over the normal reality. A layer that is active under certain circumstances.

Another interesting concept in the book is the overlapping of different times, which allows one to go missing and still be alive after centuries (no more info here to avoid spoilers).

It is interesting because we see a common thread that runs through fiction, folklore, and eyewitness accounts of real experiences: It’s always certain places where the veil between ordinary reality and an unknown dimension is thin. Time seems to run different and the motive of getting lost and trapped in a realm where time is different pops up again and again. We see typical motives from the fairy lore here, which then appear again in UFO-stories of close encounters and abductions.

But does it have some real relevance?

Our media is full of replicated content or even KI-created stories. We need to look out for the real stuff: Original field research, original interviews with witnesses, and verified stories. Then it would be interesting to see how much real events reflect this common thread.

A great discovery is researcher Paul Sinclair, who made the documentary WOLF LANDS, wrote books (Night People and the Truth Proof), and is the creator of a YouTube channel. His channel TRUTH PROOF and work are pure gold in the flood of “automated content”. His expeditions and talks with witnesses often lead to the fascinating forests and landscapes of Yorkshire, which has a reputation for the paranormal. He and his friends and family do what everybody should do who has a serious interest in phenomena: Talk to the people, visit the locations, and – important – analyse. Its a pleasure to have someone who combines open-mindedness and critical thinking, and it is interesting to hear the conclusions of such an experienced researcher. Things shouldn’t be taken too literally.

In one of his best videos, “Something haunts the woods,” he concludes: “Do certain locations guard secret knowledge? Is Danes Dyke ( a forest in Yorkshire) one of those rare places where reality frays at the edges? Here, ancient earthworks stand watch over centuries of whispered tales… To some, Danes Dyke is just a relic of a forgotten age. but to those who know its secrets…it’s a gateway to something far stranger” (Taken from the video description).

What we see again and again is that there is a convergence here. Fiction and researchers paint a similar picture, and also that researchers, authors, and scientists coming from different perspectives and different backgrounds often present similar conclusions after years of thinking and working on these themes.

Many insights from Paul’s videos find confirmation in the writings of Patrick Harpur and Jacques Vallée. Again, the common denominator is the power of place; it is location. The best of fiction, such as Fiona Barnett’s “The Dark Between The Trees” or the classics from Algernon Blackwood (The Willows, The Wendigo), takes these insights further and is also a way to deepen our understanding of an otherworld which might be right next door. Another world, which indeed is a Forest Dark.

2025/06/012025/06/01

Connection Between Paranormal Activity and Crime?

A strong connection between paranormal activity and crimes is one of the most common motives in fiction, but also in lore and in so-called true stories. There are a number of stories where the paranormal activity is considered the cause of the crime. This applies especially to hotspots like the Bridgewater triangle.

Is this a cheap excuse for criminals? Of psychopaths who want to evade persecution? Or is there more to this? Fact is that haunted landscapes are often related to a higher number of extraordinary crimes, among them shocking crimes, satanic rituals, abductions, or mysterious disappearances.

There are many arguments against paranormal influence triggering malevolent human behaviour. We are fully responsible for our actions. Claims of “a voice told me to do this” are either cheap excuses or the result of conditions like Schizophrenia. But there are perhaps natural and less natural trigger effects that can play a role.

In the case of the Bridgewater triangle, where all sorts of crimes happened as animal mutilation or vandalism, but also serious crimes as murders, copycatting might play a role. Groups of people were attracted to the reputation of the place and started their own nonsense.

There should also be other sets of circumstances considered when it comes to hotspots for crimes in forests, mysterious mountain regions, swamps, and other areas. These include remote, abandoned regions that are less densely populated, which have served as a refuge for drug dealers and other criminals. Alternatively, there may be little law enforcement in a certain region.

There is also the question of what happened in the first place

A murder and an unsolved crime are the most common reasons for later paranormal activity.

A ghost of the victim of a murderer seeking revenge. Or the crime is unsolved, and the ghost haunts the place in order to bring the murderer to justice. The brutal crime left a residue, like a memory stored at the place it happened. Many hauntings in houses or special places are connected with crimes.

Sometimes it is said that the original crime leads to paranormal activity, which causes further crimes. A house or a place, or a forest is cursed.

This is the case with the Bridgewater triangle and the Freetown Fall River Forest: The brutal murder of Indian American king Philip and the slaughter of the American indian tribes there is one reason for the curse of the Bridgewater triangle, according to some believers.

However, this is a prominent example of how it works both ways.

People also say that the massacres and the betrayal that happened there are the result of ancient, old, darker forces. That’s hard to believe, as indigenous people were slaughtered nearly everywhere in the New World.

Another reason why we may attribute crimes and other events to paranormal activity is our own mindset. Everybody knows the “local legend” concept used in countless movies and stories. The lore of haunted places goes way back to the times of the Old Testament. This creates two effects: We attribute certain traces, events, and types of crimes as ritualistic, even if there might be no occult background here. Often, it is conspiracy theories that have a life of their own in our world, which create a certain interpretation. The second effect is that we see the paranormal at work even in cases where there is no evidence for this, but there is a long and strong tradition of storytelling shaping our thinking.

Nevertheless, the “power of place” is a concept well known around the world, and there are things that cannot easily be explained away.

What is the power of place?

We are talking about a less comprehensible force and a much more mysterious force, rather than a curse or a haunting. The power of place might also be something much more complex than a vortex or a portal. And not something which is the main cause of a specific event.

It is the “something” in the trees, in the fields, in the earth, that we can never comprehend. We can feel it, it is the subtle force shaping things at certain places, not a voice but an ancient influence.

It would be naive to attribute certain events or even crimes to that force, but perhaps there is a tendency in certain places to make things more likely to happen here as in other places. Mysterious disappearances are a prominent example – conditions of a landscape, like a wilderness, can only partly explain the statistics.

The key characteristics of paranormal zones remind us that we have to abandon the normal ways of thinking in our everyday world if we want to get a sense of the unknown. Things are more paradoxical than logical. The otherworldly realm even demands we accept contradictions.

Any of these zones, like the Bridgewater Triangle, the Alaska Triangle, or the Bennington Triangle, are hotspots of countless bizarre phenomena which are not simple UFOs or hauntings. They appear to shape human history in mysterious ways over longer, eternal periods, and not as a sort of intervention that causes an individual to do a certain thing.

Why is that?

If we look at the Bridgewater Triangle, we have reports of all kinds of phenomena: Thunderbirds, UFOS, Bigfoot, little people, giant cats, orbs, experiences of being watched, a sense of sylvan dread, a mysterious hitchhiker, a trucker pursuing drivers on a lonely road, mysterious disappearances, satanic rituals, briefly the whole set of strange phenomena. This is odd. The popularity of such places might trigger hoaxes or people invent things, but it is still remarkable. Things that can’t be explained away happen. And there is a blurred line between normal reality and the otherworldly here. The phenomena are real but not literally real. This is the biggest challenge for the human mind. But it explains why there is no simple connection between crime and paranormal activity.

One of the researchers of the Bridgewater triangle said that whatever resides there is an old soul. This is a good image. Something that works in large periods and something that doesn’t relate to humankind in a way we understand. It is more something that exerts a hidden influence upon us.

What does this force want?

Of course, there is no simple answer to this. Perhaps it is the transformative power of nature. William P. Simmons writes in Lost in the Wildwood: Sylvan Dread in Weird Fiction: In the confused paths of our minds, the forest is always there, ready for us to enter, ready to enter and transform us. For centuries, our imaginations have populated the forest with mythical beasts and beings, ancient powers that inspire delight and dread. Old Gods flourish in Oak trees and rivers, Elemental spirit walk borderlands of soul and soil. The Earth itself, imbued with a secret sacred sentience, hints of vast possibilities that we cannot define.” He speaks of a “cosmic intelligence beyond our logic and science, facts and spreadsheets. A secret soul both malevolent and nourishing”.

What exactly this force does, we don’t know. What we do know is that extreme circumstances bring out the best but also the worst in men. A famine, isolation, and starvation can awaken barbaric impulses. Civilisation is always a thin layer, barbarism is never far away. But the cause of horrific actions or crimes is never a power of place, or nature, it is what already exists in humankind.

2023/06/302023/06/30

Magic Is Strong In The Forest

The forest as a magic realm is a prominent trope in almost any fantasy story and fairy tale. It’s sometimes a stereotype. The forest stands for the otherworld. Sometimes the heroes of the story want to reconnect to this otherworld. The forest is the place where reconnection seems possible. In some occasions the heroes perform rituals or they use psychoactive substances. Magic mushrooms are popular devices to reconnect or to experience deeper and spiritual dimensions of reality. The outcome is in certain cases unpredictable and a desperate attempt to recover what was lost:

In fantasy men is often a threat to the magic realm of the forest. Men destroy the forest. Men destroy the deeper, original magical dimension of reality. Often there is a fight between the original inhabitants, the fairies, the cunning people, the secret commonwealth and men. In fantasy often men is stronger. But the secret commonwealth, the little people, are going underground. Some say they return as aliens in common Ufo folklore. Instead of living in harmony with the higher realms men lives in a soulless technocratic world but which is haunted in certain moments.

There is an excellent overview in the article Where The Magic Things are: Forst in Fantasy Literature by Giovanna CHINELLATO, Sao Paulo/SP/ Brasil. She takes examples from works by J.R.R. Tolkien, Peter Beagle, Ursula K. Le Guin, George Martin, Patrick Rothfuss. The archetype of the magical forest was laid however much earlier in the myths of mankind, for example Gilgamesh and Volsunga saga.

Fantasy and Forest Horror

In forest horror the premise is not entirely different. However, the forces of nature can be overwhelming for men. The otherworld is ambiguous. The forest is a dangerous place. Attempts to connect with the spiritual realm or the elder gods end up in madness or even death. In the end the hero of the story can be another mysterious missing case, wandering around aimlessly forever as a lost soul in the forest.

The magical forest in horror is the forest dark. Nevertheless fantasy, supernatural horror and true stories or real accounts share a common concept: The forest as a living being. The concept bears some similarities with the Anima Mundi, the world soul: The idea of an intelligible entity, the inter-connection between all things, its omni-presence. This world soul can normally not seen in itself. It manifests in visionary experience and even ontological shock,

Plato speaks about the Anima Mundi as: “Thus, then, in accordance with the likely account, we must declare that this Cosmos has verily come into existence as a Living Creature endowed with soul and reason […] a Living Creature, one and visible, containing within itself all the living creatures which are by nature akin to itself”. This is, of course, encompassing everything, not only nature or the forest. But the forest is often the model. And it is in the forest the characters in a story seek unity, reconnection. In Forest Horror this can go terribly wrong.

In Forest Horror we often meet a truth-seeker, a hippie, a shaman, often a HERMIT seeking closeness with nature. That character is or pretends to be in contact with the forest, or the lord of the forest (often the magic soul of the forest is becoming a deity, for example the Celtic CERNUNNOS). The character has been for too long in the forest and is often a dangerous madman himself. Some screenplays use this constellation as dramaturgical trick, because then you don’t need to introduce some “forest demon” or similar things. (I make no exception from the rule with my own project here).

The more important point is that the truth seeking hermit gone mad presents a mirror image of the more optimist quest in fantasy stories. Giovanna Chinellato writes: “Given the, at least ideological, human-nature distancing and antagonism, characteristic of civilization (HARRISON, 2009), and considering that fantasy can have a recovery function (TOLKIEN, 2009), these fantastic forests can help humankind marvel at and reconnect with nature, possibly aiding in the development of a new and much necessary environmental awareness”.

Horror does not have that recovery function. It has a more cathartic function. It helps us to come to terms with realities. However, there is still a similarity between fantasy and horror: If nature is experienced as hostile it might be just a mirror or a consequence of man’s own wrong doing. In the forest dark we often meet our own darkness and our own inner demons.

How to express forest magic?

Either you look how to express the magic soul of the forest because you really believe in it or you need it for a story it always comes down to the same problem: We, indeed, might feel there is truth in it. However how do we show it? Unseen demonic force? Or positive magical vision? There are lot of temptations particularly in the era of digital effects. The problem is not, is it “good” or “bad, the problem is, does it feel right? This is perhaps a more challenging problem in horror rather than in fantasy.

2022/09/082022/09/08

A Secret Character In Folk Horror Stories

There is an interesting question about some popular folk horror movies. Are they supernatural stories or not? The threat in these stories comes from men, not from some monster, ghost, or supernatural entity. Nevertheless, the basic premise of traditional folk horror films and novels is often a secret cult worshipping a (pagan) deity in a remote town.

That deity, demigod, demon, he who walks behind the rows, is an important character in the story. As we know, he is usually not a friendly guy. He demands sacrifices. Human sacrifices. He messes up people’s minds. In some stories, he seems to be like the Old Testament god. Brutal. Merciless. Demanding. He manipulates the people.

But do the people in the remote town or the wilderness believe, or do they only pretend to believe? Is it just their leader who uses the cult to manifest his power? Does the writer believe in these invisible powers? Does the filmmaker believe in the pagan gods or the telluric forces? It’s hard to say. You can write such a story without believing in anything. The cult can work as a convention. Maybe the original religious purpose is lost. A cult is a belief system to impose power and rules upon people.

It’s the land

In many cases, there is an assumption that supernatural powers are a reality even if there are no supernatural beings occurring in the story. What is the god or the supernatural power? It is the land itself, this dark spiritual power of the land. The magic forces and the gods manifest themselves in the landscape. It’s in the woods, or is the forest itself? There is one obvious connection between the worshippers and the deity. In THE WICKER MAN, the cult is a fertility cult. That is the case for many of these stories. It’s obvious in Shirley Jackson’s classic, The Lottery: “Lottery in June, corn be heavy soon”. Even the ritual in the story is forgotten and there is no worshipping of some deity, the magical thinking is apparent.

Here is the big difference between folk horror and backwood drama and horror. In folk horror, it seems there is, at last, some sort of higher entity, a kind of energy, a god which is in all things or a presence. The opposite is backwood dramas like STRAW DOGS. There is no god in Straw Dogs. No magic of the land.

The Ancient Gods

The gods in Folk Horror are great old ones. There is often a connection with the past, with remnants of an era long gone. Ancient symbols are an expression of presence. There is something here which has been here before men arrived and will perhaps be here when men have left.

But there is another interesting thing here: The gods are local gods. Their cult is mostly a local cult. The entity is tied to the land. The deity is often connected to a certain thing in the land. In The Children Of The Corn, it is a Corn god. The worshippers are often a secretive community. They are obviously not traveling a lot.

Mostly it is a stranger, not aware of the cult in the first place, which is confronted with the local cult and sometimes with the powers of place. In IN THE EARTH, the entity in the forest seems to create hallucinogenic visions. That’s a common thing. The stranger is of course often the victim. He can become the sacrifice as in The Wicker Man.

Communication

Another interesting question is if there is any communication with the gods or the energies of a place. It depends. If it is a story that is closer to cosmic horror, then these forces appear sometimes oblivious towards men. They are not evil nor benign in a human sense as the mysterious higher forces in the classic weird tale “The Willows” from Algernon Blackwood. There is no communication. These powers don’t care about humans.

In other cases, this is what the characters hope. They hope for insights into the deeper order of things and perform rituals to get an answer from the gods. The wish to communicate and ” to see” is a driving force. It’s no wonder that the ritual is often a drug party, for example, Beltane. People want to look into the otherworld.

Gifts From The Gods

Wisdom is one gift from the god’s ritualist hope. But it is not only wisdom and a rich harvest. There are even stories where the dead should come back, like the Irish horror movie WAKE WOOD. Here, the forest is again a secret character.

The secret cult is empowered by the gods living in the Earth, on the mountain or in the forest. The community in these places is a special one. Even though we don’t see the secret character in these stories, he is always there. He is steering their lives in many ways.

It is worth thinking about this ominous presence in the land, in the forest, in the earth. In stories and in the real world.

Peyton Robinson raises some interesting points in the article The Harrowing and Hypocritical Humanity of Folk Horror in Filmschool Rejects. One of them: What lies in the terrain we’ve built our whole lives on, and who holds the power?