Princeton native Steve Asher is no stranger to writing about the paranormal.
His work tends to focus on the subject, tying it to his home state. Each chapter in “More Curious Counties of Kentucky,” published in January, details fearsome folklore from such counties as Livingston, Lyon, Logan, Marshall, McCracken, Todd, Trigg, Union, Warren and Webster.
The work is a continuation of 2020’s “Curious Counties from Kentucky: Dang Strange and Mostly True Tales” and follows earlier works like “Hauntings of the Saint Vincent Academy” and “Hauntings of the Western Lunatic Asylum,” which similarly draw on his western Kentucky heritage.
“I do pride myself on trying to talk about this area because I’ve heard so many people say it’s flyover country, and there’s so much here,” Asher said. “It’s more than Kentucky Fried Chicken and the Derby.”
The author of seven books spent time working in steel and law enforcement before putting pen to paper. Law enforcement allowed Asher to follow in the footsteps of his father, who worked in the state penitentiary in the 1950s and ‘60s.
“I definitely was affected by all the great ‘70s and ‘80s movies and Star Wars and Six-Million Dollar Man and all that,” Asher said. “The core of it, the work ethic, was definitely drilled into my head, but he taught me a lot about how to treat people.”
Princeton was the launching point for much to come. Asher and his ex-wife adopted two children from China and Thailand. During his trip to Thailand, he witnessed an uprising that lasted longer than anticipated.
“I got to learn a lot about the ancestral-worshiping ghost culture in Thailand,” Asher said. “There’s a ghost for everything, which had always been an interest to me growing up as a kid.”
Seeing other countries, cultures, religions, mindsets and socioeconomic classes broadened Asher’s perspective before he returned to Princeton, inspiring him to write about what he had seen in his downtime from his primary occupation teaching life skills to special needs adults.
“Home is where the heart is,” Asher said. “That’s corny, but you know what I’m saying.”
His next books on the horizon are “Superstitions, Rituals and Deathly Lore” about the origins of certain cultural behaviors, and the tentatively titled “By the Master’s Command: Real Life Exorcism Encounters” about possession culture.
Asher recently visited Hopkinsville Christian-County Public Library and plans to discuss and sign his latest book for readers at the John L. Street Library in Cadiz.
