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eBook Category: Horror/Humor
eBook Description: A determined skeptic tries to debunk a very odd phenomenon, to his own satisfaction but probably not the reader's. Important health warning: contains maggots!

eBook Publisher: Fictionwise.com, Published: Dark Fantasies, ed. Chris Morgan, 1989
Fictionwise Release Date: September 2002

21 Reader Ratings: Great Good OK Poor

Available eBook Formats [MultiFormat - What's this?]: Adobe Acrobat (PDF) [50 KB], eReader (PDB) [24 KB], Palm Doc (PDB) [10 KB], Rocket/REB1100 (RB) [10 KB], Microsoft Reader (LIT) [62 KB] - PocketPC 1.0+ Compatible, Franklin eBookMan (FUB) [82 KB], hiebook (KML) [51 KB], Sony Reader (LRF) [35 KB], iSilo (PDB) [8 KB], Mobipocket (PRC) [11 KB], Kindle Compatible (MOBI) [38 KB], OEBFF Format (IMP) [17 KB]
Words: 2626
Reading time: 7-10 min.
Microsoft Reader (LIT) Format: Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud ENABLED
Adobe Acrobat (PDF) Format:  Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud DISABLED
All Other formats: Printing DISABLED, Read-aloud DISABLED

Like UFOs, astrology and Uri Geller, the Micky Valdon myth is a tabloid journalist's dream--a media creation long overdue for debunking. Everyone has read Dr David Evans's sensationalist book Revenant. Everyone thinks they know the story, but no one knows the actual facts. My brief was to uncover the facts.

Armed with my Psychic Critic credentials, I travelled to North Wales to take a long, cool look at the place where the Valdon hype had all begun. Wales--what an appropriate setting, when you think about it, full of old Celtic ghosts, its hills crowned with ancient graves and settlements, its valleys dotted with crumbling shrines and holy wells. The northwest county of Gwynedd where Valdon lived is the Welshest part of all Wales, actually taking its name from a forgotten kingdom of legend. Superstition fills the air, thick as morning mists on the mountains of Snowdonia. Even hard-headed travel writers like Jan Morris can go all weepy and mystical when it comes to atmospheric Wales. Small wonder that the legend of Micky Valdon's "return" grew so fast and far, nourished in this fertile soil.

The obvious starting-place for my investigation was "Ty Gwyn", the stone-built Valdon cottage halfway up the mountain Diffwys (almost as high as famous Cader Idris, which bulks impressively to the south). It's a tortuous road that climbs up there, and the suspension of my rented Ford Escort took some bad knocks on the final mile of grass-track rising from the village Cwm-mynach. All those Welsh names! I felt half snared in romance myself.

At "Ty Gwyn", though, Valdon's attractive local-born wife (or widow?) Angharad wasn't in a mood to co-operate. Media attention had of course faded a good deal by then, eight weeks after the publication of Revenant, and only a couple of reporters had called that morning: but Angharad snapped at me and peremptorily ordered me to go away. The reaction, perhaps, of someone who didn't care to face informed questions? Of someone with things to hide? I will leave readers to make their own decision.