Another Review of "Asian Supernatural"

Here's another review of "Asian Supernatural" by PGS contributor Alex Paman. This time, it's by Lee Cataluna of The Star Advertiser in Honolulu. The title of the review is "Author Puts Spirited Effort Into Pacific Ghost Catalog". An excerpt:

It took years, but Alex G. Paman cataloged every ghost, demon and supernatural entity he could find in Asian and Pacific literature. The result of his dogged research is the amazing book "Asian Supernatural -- Including Hawaii and the Pacific" released by Mutual Publishing this summer.

Paman, 42, an illustrator and writer who lives in Sacramento, was born in Quezon City in the Philippines and moved with his family to California when he was a child.

"I had always been interested in the supernatural, particularly the characters in native Filipino ghost-lore," he said. "Since I was a child, I also had this obsession of collecting every shred of information about any subject I was interested in."

He visited libraries, used book stores and cultural centers and added to his collection over the years. If there was a reference mentioning a supernatural character listed in a bibliography, he would hunt down that book.

"My collection grew from a handful to several bookcases' worth over the years, divided by Asian culture and sitting in my apartment gathering dust."

The one book he longed for didn't seem to exist. There was no reference book that listed all the ghosts throughout Asia and the Pacific. Paman decided he would try to write one and methodically went through his entire collection, working into the night after coming home from his job.