The Sense of Being Stared At

Rupert Sheldrake, author of Dogs That Know When Their Owners Are Coming Home and The Presence of the Past, continues to have good luck with book titles: his new one is The Sense of Being Stared At (Crown). For those of us who have been haunted from time to time by that sense of being stared at from behind, the book is an important support, and a great argument against those who don’t believe us. According to Sheldrake, the impulse to turn around and look for the staring person is not equally strong in everyone, and some people—waiters, for example—intentionally resist the urge. There is much wonderful stuff here, all of it rigorously tested: thought transference, everyday telepathy, telephone telepathy, deaths foretold and the wonderfully titled chapter “Are Images in the Brain, or Are They Where They Seem to Be?” This guy is good, and his book is packed with hundreds of little-known facts of interest.