Fleur Britten, editor of Hg2 London tells us the perfect place to be a ghost. While three of the Hg2 writers, Kate Spicer, Mary Meyer and Simon Kurs share with us their horrific Halloween tips! Scream! Howl! Shudder! Jumping out at you somewhere along the line you'll find the Run Riot Guide to Halloween. Click here to read Fleurs interview about the book, Hg2 London (out 15 Oct 2010).

FLEUR ON PLACES SHE’D LIKE TO BE A GHOST
Highgate Cemetery
Swain’s Lane, West Hampstead, NW6.
020 8340 1834 www.highgate-cemetery.org
Step into an eerie Victorian gothic underworld, all overgrown vines gripping the ornate tombs and headstones of the age (including those of Karl Marx, George Eliot and Michael Faraday), and newer arrivals including Malcolm McLaren and Alexander Litvinenko. The older, western half is only accessible by guided tour (£7); the eastern half, opened 1854, can be roamed unguided (£3). Dress appropriately and don’t bait the ghosts.

Freemasons' Hall
60 Great Queen Street, WC2
020 7395 9251 www.freemasonry.london.museum
No need to wait for the special squeeze: tours are available Mon-Fri of the Art Deco Grand Temple – the other 23 onsite are in ‘constant demand’ (free).

Wilton's Music Hall
Graces Alley Cable Street, E1
020 7702 2789 www.wiltons.org.uk
An evocative Victorian timewarp: commissioned by John Wilton in 1858, this is the world’s oldest surviving Grand Music Hall (just – it’s now semi-derelict, and rudely authentic for it). Its programme is pretty inspiring too: avant-garde revues, talks by eminent talking heads, powerful theatre and moving music (recently, a Creole choir). The atmospheric Mahogany bar (open Mon-Fri) hosts romping, troubadour-style bands every Monday; £5 tours monthly.

Royal Courts of Justice
The Strand, WC2
020 7947 6000 www.hmcourts-service.gov.uk
Glorious gothic castle built of Portland stone in 1882 that’s also a publicly accessible court with 88 court rooms, fascinating civic and criminal trials and bad wigs (free).

Dennis Severs’ House (pictured above)
18 Folgate Street, Spitalfields, E1
020 7247 4013 www.dennissevershouse.co.uk
Open: Mon 6–9pm; Sun noon–4pm; fortnightly Mon noon–2pm. From £5–12
One of London’s most engaging – if obscure – delights may be found at the home/museum/‘experience’ of the late American artist Dennis Severs, who lived here from 1979 to his death in 1999. The cultural significance is two-fold: firstly, the building, dating from 1725, is a Huguenot townhouse, originally inhabited by French silk weavers. Secondly – this is where the eccentric Severs comes in – its 11 beautiful rooms, from cellar to parlour to smoking room to bedrooms, are atmospherically set-designed (variously Hogarthian, rococo, baroque) to conjure an authentic picture of domestic life from 1725 to 1919, with ghosts still lingering around half-drunk coffee cups, open books and burning fires. But this is no twee pastiche; rather, you – in strict silence and, after dark, by candlelight – become part of the theatre. Enough – it doesn’t do to know too much before going.

KATE SPICER, FOOD CRITIC FOR Hg2, ON HER GUIDE TO HALLOWEEN
So many Londoners are way too cool for both school and dressing up for Halloween but that doesn't stop the familiar autumnal nip giving the evening of the 31st a bit of a nostalgic thrill. Back the mind goes to evenings spent squirting ketchup on the headmaster’s Vauxhall and snogging boys in bus stops while dressed as a vampire with fake blood dribbling down your chin. The way to enjoy Halloween kicks without looking like you came as the jerk is to access your inner sinner. The ghoul is in you. Dress the bad in you and take it out to play. Halloween is a chance to go all Marlon Brando and immerse yourself in the role of a very bad version of you.

My inner bad is Theresa Russell starring in her father Ken's Whore. The phenomenal late 1980s wardrobe is enough to turn a good girl bad. Releasing the beast of imagination will mean a good afternoon spent finding the perfect vintage look (perhaps in Rellik on Golborne Road) and then setting up some cheekiness in the very finest of our elegant but always a little bit sleazy hotel bars. I got chatting to some stunningly beautiful and mercenary ladies of the night in the bar at China Tang in the Dorchester. The new Savoy bar opened on Sunday, 10th Oct. Perhaps Halloween is the perfect night to inject a bit of beautifully dressed fantasy sleaze in there. If you're rolling like a bunch of brasses on a day trip then try and book a booth, somehow, anyhow, at The Starland Social Club in Notting Hill. I have yet to find a place in west London that will smile quite so nicely while a girl behaves like a martini drinking viper. Then again, if this isn't really your bag, you could always dress up as a pumpkin, I doubt they'd let you sit at the bar and drink Martinis at Claridges dressed like that though, but there's always All Bar One.

MARY MEYER, PUB CRITIC FOR Hg2 (and RR Editor), ON HER GUIDE TO HALLOWEEN
Some people think that a theme is nonessential for Halloween as the day itself is enough. I would usually blanch in the face of an absence of imagination but sometimes exceptions prove the rule and this year's Potty Mouth Disco mini festival is a case in point. A raucous back to back celebration of ghoulishness first at a secret warehouse location on Hallow's eve and then a fiesta of disco at new Dalston venue The Nest on the day itself is set to be a hub of glorious - nay bloody - wrong doing. The on site costumiers and makeup artists from I Fancy You Ltd - nudge,nudge - will assist the apathetic but they will not be overworked. Potty Mouth nights are exceptionally potty on the most ordinary of nights. A selection of house, dance and techno toons will come courtesy of Radio One's Alex Metric and friends. Be prepared to scream.
 
The Halloween Weekender
Secret Warehouse Party (location revealed on day before party), 9pm-6am, Sat 30th October
The Nest, Dalston, N16 7XJ, 8pm-2am, Sun 31st October
Tickets (valid for both days): £10 advance (tickets avilable from Rough Trade and Data Transmission); also available on the door on Saturday night £13 before midnight / £15 after

SIMON KURS, DRINK CRITIC FOR Hg2, ON HIS GUIDE TO HALLOWEEN
While Christmas and Easter operate very much along the lines of diminishing and increasingly boozy returns, Halloween is one of the few dates in the annual diary that just gets more fun. In recent years, I’ve been to an east London warehouse rave, a south London member’s club and all manner of brilliantly ghastly house parties, filled with ghouls, ghosts, dead celebrities and…someone dressed as Jedward, bizarrely.

There are only two real pieces of advice for enjoying the night: Make sure you’re with friends; and plan your outfit well in advance. Extra points go for originality and execution. Traverse the bad taste line without crossing it too far, and never opt for the obvious. Girls: it’s not about looking sexy (or slutty), you have the rest of the year for that. Guys: a little more effort than just a bit of makeup, please.
 
For a Halloween supper I can’t think of anywhere more appropriately blood and guts than the offal-tastic St John in Smithfield, while the Bloody Marys at 69 Colebrook Row, the top secret basemeent bar in Islington easily the yummiest in town.
 
And for the more daring this Halloween weekend: The Nest, Dalston’s newest dive bar (clearly a fav of the Hg2 team) in what used to be Barden’s Boudoir, is hosting an end of the world party . “On Saturday 30th October the world will be overrun by killer zombies and we’re all gonna die,” reads the blurb.

“The good news is that while the rest of the world freaks out and cries and stuff, we’re going to gather together all the people we love, lock ourselves in a club, barricade the doors, get smashed, and party for as long as we can until the zombies break in and eat us.” Sounds amazing.


THE RUN RIOT GUIDE TO HALLOWEEN
Compilied by Jamie, Katie, Vienna, Clare, Charlotte and Becky

21:00 Fri 29/10
OMGIMY: 'Halloween Ghost Train Drive-In…Of Terror!' at the BGWMC
Feel the terror of all of William Castle's interactive audience, spine tingling moments in one movie! Pus dancing, special performances and a spooky Tatty Devine prize!

21:30 Fri 29/10
The Last Tuesday Society: 'A Danse Macabre' beneath London Bridge
Dance the dance of death at the Last Tuesday Society Halloween Ball this Halloween weekend with a delightfully decadent party. The stuff of your wildest nightmares.

19:00 Sat 30/10
Strangeworks: 'Dance Of The Dead' Parade, starting in Hoxton Square
Join the Dance of the Dead for its 5yr anniversary! From Hoxton Sq, the theatrical parade of 300 people heads to the bars of Gillet Sq (Dalston). LDN's Mexican Day of the Dead is here! All invited! Learn the dance moves by watching their scary instructional tutorial here!

20:00 Sat 30/10
Ladyfest Ten: 'Zombie Prom' at the Papered Parlour
Step back in time for a rollicking rockabilly romp through America’s atomic age – zombie prom style!

21:00 Sat 30/10
'The Bay Of Blood' at the BGWMC
Singing! Surfing! Sinning! to their Halloween beach party soundtrack of skin crawling sixties swells, raucous retro riptides and rotten rythm ripples.

21:00 Sat 30/10
White Mischief: 'The Haunted Ballroom' at Scala
A Spine-Chilling Night of Malign Manifestations and Ruinous Revels. Featuring a thrilling line-up, including Nina Conti, Abandoman, Vicky Butterfly, London Faerie and more!

16:00 Sun 31/10
'Steamboat Bordello' at The Dixie Queen Paddle Steamer
All Aboard the Dixie Queen for a Decadent Celebration of Halloween Like No Other, with DJ El Nino, The Correspondents and more!

21:00 Sun 31/10
Jodie Harsh / Circus: 'Halloween' at Paramount
Taking Halloween parties to new heights in this one-off evening themed around ‘A Nightmare in New York’ with live shows & DJ sets until the early hours. Feat. Amanda Lepore, Cazwell, Ruby Goe & more.


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Q: Hg2 London is available from 15 Oct. Is that a coincidence or wot?! On that very same day back in 1903 a classic adventure novel by Baroness Emmuska Orczy first opened as a theatrical production. Now, the story features the daring exploits of what we might refer to as the ultimate Hedonistic dandy! Off course, the story is off a brilliant Englishman (who naturally resides mostly in London) rescuing aristocratic French ladies from the chop. The question is what is the novel called?

A: 1) L'Homme au Masque de Fer. .2) The Scarlet Pimpernel .3) The Misfortunes of Virtue .4) Mr Nice