As the subtitle tells you, this book is devoted to stories of occult detectives, a term that I define fairly broadly — to include any fictional character who contends regularly with the supernatural. Thus, although not all occult detectives are monster fighters, all monster fighters are clearly occult detectives.

We decided to go with the present main title because Those Who Detect the Occult just didn’t have the same “zing” to it.

The character of the occult detective has been part of our popular culture for more than a century. The most comprehensive listing of supernatural sleuths can be found at G. W. Thomas’ “Ghostbreakers” website (occultdetective.tripod.com/all.htm), although it needs updating. Thomas lists 164 occult detective characters — in books, films, comics and television — appearing between the mid-Nineteenth Century and 1999.

From the beginning, (probably J. Sheridan Le Fanu’s Martin Hessilius, in 1872), the occult detective often wasn’t — a detective, that is. He was often a doctor, sometimes a scientist, occasionally (as in the person of Abraham Van Helsing) both.

In modern fiction, the occult detective may be, among other things, a private eye, a police officer (in a universe that recognizes the supernatural), a reporter, a bounty hunter, a priest, a wizard/witch for hire, an antiquarian, an assassin — even a waitress.