My New Book: Top Secret Alien Abduction Files

Top Secret Alien Abduction Files is my new book (November 1 is the official publication date). Here's the info on the book from the publisher, Red Wheel/Weiser:

"For decades, people have reported close encounters with extraterrestrial entities. Witnesses describe being kidnapped by large-headed, black-eyed creatures from other worlds. Those same creatures have become popularly known as "the Grays." There is, however, another aspect to the alien abduction controversy.

"Abductees very often report being followed and spied upon by military and government personnel. It is typical for abductees to see black helicopters hovering directly over their homes in an intimidating manner. Phone calls are monitored. Emails are hacked into. Strange men dressed in black suits are seen photographing the homes of the abductees. All of this brings us to the matter of what have become known in the domain of alien abduction research as 'Military Abductions,' or 'MILABS.'

"According to numerous abductees, after being kidnapped by aliens they are kidnapped again . . . by the government. These follow-up events are the work of a powerful group hidden deep within the military and the intelligence community. It is the secret agenda of this highly classified organization to figure out what the so-called Grays are really up to. And, the best way for the government to get the answers is to interrogate those who have come face-to-face with the UFO phenomenon: the abductees. Why is the government secretly compiling files on alien abductees? Is the alien abduction issue so sinister that it has become a matter of national security proportions?"

No Return - Reviewed

No Return is the title of a new book from David Booher. It is published by the good folks at Anomalist Books. The subtitle is UFO Abduction or Covert Operation? That’s a very good question! I finished reading the book last week and, I can say with certainty, it does not disappoint. It’s a real-life, little-known, saga that dates back to the latter part of the 1950s. It still remains filled with enigmas and puzzles, close to sixty years after it occurred.

Anomalist Books’ publicity page for No Return states: “On a lonesome road in Utah, a young soldier returning from leave speeds through the desert night. Suddenly the sky lights up as a blazing object streaks across the highway and crashes nearby. Stunned, the soldier stops and decides to investigate. Little does he know, but his life will never be the same again. This is the true story of a man named Gerry Irwin. Following a mysterious experience in Utah in 1959, inexplicable blackouts and bizarre behavior threatened to derail his promising Army career. Then one day he suddenly deserted his Army post in Texas and disappeared without a trace. No one knows what became of him—until now. What happened to Gerry Irwin? Was he abducted by aliens, in what would amount to the first known case of this phenomenon on American soil? Or was he a pawn in a covert intelligence operation? And how does his story really end? A new investigation launched in 2013 attempts to answer these and other questions, revealing along the way the ordeal of a man whose mind was ravaged by a confrontation with the unknown.”

Those are the two opening paragraphs from a new review from me of the latest title from Anomalist Books: No Return, by David Booher. It's a great book, very intriguing, and well worth reading!

You can read my review here, and you can find more on the book at the links above.

UFO or Mind-Games?

And another one, this one on a famous UFO event of the 1970s that, just perhaps, was not a UFO event, after all. You can read the full article at Jimharold.com. Here's how it starts:

What if one of Ufology’s most cherished cases turned out to be something very different? Something far more down to earth, but of a distinctly conspiratorial nature. Yep, I can see the daggers being drawn already. Too bad for the belief-driven. There’s nothing worse than a mind made up. And there’s nothing better than shaking things up and addressing alternative theories when it comes to the matter of UFOs. After all, none of us really know what the truth is, when it comes to the UFO phenomenon. So, thinking outside of the box is vital. All of which brings us to a certain, famous UFO event of late 1973.

On the night of October 10, 1973, two men – Charles Hickson and Calvin Parker – were fishing on the banks of Mississippi’s Pascagoula River. All was going fine. That is, until approximately 9:00 p.m. rolled around. That’s when all hell broke loose. Yet, it all began relatively calmly. It didn’t stay that way, however. As they fished, Parker and Hickson suddenly noticed a light in the distance. Not only that, it was following the river and appeared to be coming in their direction. Which was not necessarily a good thing.

Mike Clelland and "The Messengers"

Mike Clelland's new book, The Messengers: Owls, Synchronicity and the UFO Abductee is an excellent read. It's also a book for which I provided a lot of input. Don't miss this one, if you're interested in some of the more intriguing and thought-provoking aspects of the UFO phenomenon in general and the "abductee" issue in partricular.

Here's the publisher's info on Mike's book:

"Without question, this is a classic by one of the most exciting new authors in the UFO field today. After reading it, your view of reality will never be the same. The owl has held a place of reverence and mystique throughout history. And as strange as this might seem, owls are also showing up in conjunction with the UFO experience. Mike Clelland has collected a wealth of first-hand accounts in which owls manifest in the highly charged moments that surround alien contact. There is a strangeness to these accounts that defy simple explanations. This book explores implications that go far beyond what more conservative researchers would dare consider. But the owl connection encompasses more than the UFO experience. It also includes profound synchronicities, ancient archetypes, dreams, shamanistic experiences, personal transformation, and death. From the mythic legends of our ancient past to the first-hand accounts of the UFO abductee, owls are playing some vital role. This is also a deeply personal story. It is an odyssey of self-discovery as the author grapples with his own owl and UFO encounters. What plays out is a story of transformation with the owl at the heart of this journey."

Putting a Stupid Story to Rest

Anyone who says the late alien abduction researcher, John E. Mack, was murdered is an idiot. He was not. I still get messages and emails from people telling me his death was suspicious. It wasn't. It was a tragic accident. There's a new article from me on all this at Mysterious Universe. I don't expect it to sway the paranoid crowd though...

John Keel: Ahead of His Time

There's another new Mysterious Universe article from me.

This one on how John Keel, way back in the 1960s and 1970s, was talking about certain aspects of the UFO phenomenon/alien abduction controversy  that most people weren't even thinking about until the 1980s.

We're talking about abducted women, hybrid babies, and even the Black-Eyed Children...

Betty, Barney and the Military

Over at Mysterious Universe there's a new article from me that looks into one aspect of the famous Betty and Barney Hill "alien abduction" case that often gets overlooked.

What that might be? The interest shown in the case by the military...

Abductions - Out of the Body

My latest Mysterious Universe article addresses a controversial aspect of alien abduction accounts. Hell, all the aspects are controversial, but for me, one stands out. It starts like this...

"One of the aspects of so-called 'alien abduction' experiences that fascinates me is the way in which some witnesses report their mind and visual-senses becoming detached from their physical body during the course of the encounter. Two cases, in particular, stand out. UFO researcher, good friend, and author Greg Bishop, says of one particularly relevant case from 1973: 'The main participant in that case was named Judy Doraty, and she had been driving back from a bingo game on May 23 of that year outside Houston, Texas, with her daughter, mother, sister, and brother-in-law.' Suddenly, everyone in the car witnessed 'a bright light in the sky' that seemed to be pacing them.

"'On their return home,' Greg continues, 'the light was still with them and, ominously, moved in closer. The family, as well as a group who came running out of the Doraty house, was shocked to see a huge disk-shaped object with rows of windows float silently over the property and across an adjacent field. It soon shot off straight up into the sky, going from ‘very, very big to very, very little in a matter of seconds,’ Doraty recalled.'"

Mind Games and Alien Abductions

"When, in the mid-1980s, plans were formulated by the iron-fist regime of then-Prime Minister Thatcher to base nuclear 'Cruise' missiles at strategic military bases in the British Isles, it provoked massive demonstrations on the part of the general public – and particularly at a military establishment called Greenham Common.

"As a result of the planned placement of missiles at Greenham Common, a large group of women peace-protesters set up camp outside the base. It wasn’t long, however, before many of the women began to experience a series of disturbing symptoms, including deep depression, overwhelming anxiety attacks, intense migraine-like headaches, alarming losses of short-term memory, and much more of a distinctly mind-destabilizing nature."

The above is how my latest Mysterious Universe article begins.

And here's how it continues...

An Alley of Nightmares

If you're big into the whole alien abduction controversy, then there's a new (and big) book you should consider getting a copy of: Nightmare Alley: Fearsome Tales of Alien Abduction by Timothy Green Beckley.

This is an excellent new title that focuses its attention - in chapter-by-chapter form - on many of the classic cases from abduction history: Herbert Schirmer, Betty and Barney Hill, Betty Andreasson, Charles Hickson & Calvin Parker, Whitley Strieber, Charles L. Moody, Alan Godfrey, Travis Walton, as well as a lot of lesser known cases, such as the 1983 affair of Alfred Burtoo and the 1980s experiences of Christa Tilton.

Each of the above cases (and many more, too) are given good, solid treatment and commentary, along with theories, insights and much more, all relative to the respective cases under the microscope.

And, if you don't have an extensive library on abductions, but want to find out more about the subject, the players, the researchers and the abductees themselves, then Nightmare Alley is a great place to start, since you'll have all the key AA events under one cover, instead of having to dish out a lot of dosh for dozens of old - and sometimes hard to find - titles from yesteryear.

On top of that, the book also reproduces Martin Cannon's notable and thought-provoking paper (also of yesteryear and which provoked a lot of interest and controversy when it first surfaced) The Controllers, which presents the AA phenomenon in a very different light...