Review: Psychic Travel
by Christopher Dane
Today I'm reviewing Psychic Travel by Christopher Dane. It's kind of a vague title, but the back of the book says "The awe-inspiring, eye-opening world of out-of-body experiences." The copyright is 1974 by "Eugene Olson" which might be Dane's real (non-pen) name?
If I had to describe this book succinctly I'd say it is all "Sensationalized Grocery-store Tabloid-style astral projection narratives." It's all fast-food OBE stories, one after another. These are supposedly true stories about out-of-body experiences, but they're certainly embellished by the author the way the movie "Titanic" sensationalized the events of April 14, 1912. In fact, some of the OBE narratives are even excerpted from the "National Enquirer," a United States tabloid known for its sensationalist "JFK Abducted by UFOs!"-style nonsense.
All of the narratives are short, just a page or two, sometimes three, which makes the book easy to read, but they all lack depth.
Most of the stories are about out-of-body experiences, but several are near-death experiences as well. A few delve into bilocation, autoscopy (doppelganger), and even some death-bed apparitions.
A few of these stories are about well-known astral projection authors like Oliver Fox, and some were lifted from Robert Crookall's books and the famous book Phantasms of the Living.
On the one hand, Dane echoes the words of Fox:
"Once this stage had been reached, the student must guard himself against the appearance of apparitions and frightening sounds. These should be ignored. One should especially resist the illusions that will come and seek to interrupt the student, breaking his trance." (pg. 53)
Good advice, and I gave the same advice in my article about the "Guardian of the Threshold." But later, Dane does some fear mongering himself. For example, he quotes one of Brad Steiger's books which cautions the reader:
"And there are always evil entities which one must truly be on guard against during the projection experience. These creatures of darkness are always seeking a passive living body to invade and inhabit." (pg. 135)
Let me assure you: this is a non-issue, and as Fox says above, "should be ignored." I don't believe for a minute that an astral entity can take over your body while you're away.
In fact, I've been astral projecting more than 40 years and in all that time I've only felt "unsafe" less than a dozen times, and most of those OBEs I aborted due to an over-abundance of caution.
One of the book's chapters is titled "Sex that is out of this world" but it didn't sound very authentic. Frankly, it sounded like complete fiction to me. Maybe some editor somewhere suggested Dane could sell more books if he added a chapter about astral sex, so he pulled this out of his imagination.
The chapter isn't even about astral sex. It's more about a man who has a physical sexual encounter with a supposedly bilocated promiscuous woman. In other words, a woman who allegedly could leave her body and bilocate to the man of her choice for sex. The subject of astral sex is another topic for another day, but if you're curious I did write about it in my FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) about halfway down.
Dane also talked briefly about Dr. Charles Tart's lab experiments with "Mr. X" (later revealed to be Robert Monroe himself) and "Miss Z", but there are much better renditions of that information in other books.
The book is 192 pages, with small footprint and tight margins. I'm only giving this book 2 stars out of 5. It's not exactly "bad." It just isn't good. There are much better books out there.
Bob Peterson
06 February 2024
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Eugene Olsen is the the real name of Brad Steiger. He wrote dozens of books. I've only just discovered this site, from your book Hacking the OBE, which I'm now reading for the second time. Thanks for all your research and generosity in sharing it.
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