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    An alternative way to explore and explain the mysteries of our world. "Published since 1985, online since 2001."

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New Book Reviews



By Brent Raynes




The Alien Abduction Files:
The Most Startling Cases of Human- Alien Contact Ever Reported By Kathleen Marden and Denise Stoner


New Page Books
The Career Press, Inc.
220 West Parkway, Unit 12
Pompton Plains, NJ 07444
2013, 253 pages, U.S. $16.99
ISBN-13: 978-1-60163-271-5

Reviewed by Brent Raynes

Written by Kathleen Marden, niece of the famed UFO abductee Betty Hill, and Denise Stoner, an abduction researcher and abductee herself, together have conducted and compiled revealing details and surveys from these experiencers. Drawing responses from experiencers, as well as non-experiencers as a control, specific and significant patterns and correlations in the data have emerged.

Among experiencers they surveyed, Denise and 88 percent (43 of 49) had had paranormal activity in their homes, ranging from mysterious orbs of light, objects inexplicably moving through the air, lights turning off and on themselves, doors opening and shutting, etc. Of the 43 who described such incidents, 22 revealed that it began after their first abduction. Denise and 88 percent (44 of 50) felt that they had received telepathic messages from alien beings. Denise and 50 percent (25 of 50) claimed they were given the gift of healing following their abduction experiences. Denise and 79 percent (26 of 33) stated that they had developed new psychic abilities after an abduction incident. This also confirms findings noted in earlier studies by UFO authors John Keel, Brad Steiger, Dr. Berthold E. Schwarz, Jacques Vallee, and others (including myself) as to the prominence and potential significance of the paranormal elements in these cases.

Many other fascinating and thought-provoking aspects and features of the abduction experience are also carefully explored, such as conscious memories versus hypnotic memories, the characteristics and advantages and disadvantages of the hypnotic process, how experiencers often report malfunctions of various electrical equipment in their presence (one allegedly had a measurable electrical field around her body), the reports of sexual sounding procedures, missing fetus syndrome, so-called “alien implants,” scoop marks, and distinctions between presumably real abduction memories and fantasy, hypnagogic and hypnopompic hallucinations, REM sleep, sleep paralysis, and other factors.



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Look Up!
My Encounters with ETs and Angels
By Devara ThunderBeat

2013, www.thunderbeat.com
Reviewed by Brent Raynes

Since age four, growing up in New York, the author had her first memory that something very strange was happening in her life. Since then, and many experiences and places since (from Egypt to Sedona) Devara has had what have been for her numerous positive experiences with “ETs and angels.” However, her overall perspective is one that quite a few experiencers will take issue as she writes: “All of my encounters have been positive ones, not like the negative experiences you see on television. These are false and made up by Hollywood.”

Though Hollywood is a powerful public influencer, there are numerous “abductees” who have described traumatic experiences who would strongly disagree with this “contactee’s” statement. In her introduction, Devara states that one of the reasons she wanted to write this book was “to help us in our awakening and ascension process,” a mission she states that is in keeping with her ET contacts who are “beautiful, loving beings.” She also quotes Jesus saying, “Ask and you shall receive.”

Obviously from her viewpoint it’s all a pretty positive and straightforward spiritual process. I am biased myself toward leaning on positive spiritual processes as well, though I also subscribe to that rather popular expression that’s going around these days that goes something like this: We’re spiritual beings having physical experiences. As such, we don’t always share the exact same reality, or perception thereof. We don’t see or experience things the same way. To me, spiritual evolution involves digesting everything, the good and the bad in life, taking in the proverbial “big picture,” and doing my best at trying to make sense of it all and making something meaningful and beneficial from it.

Devara, and others like her, may be on a radically different path from many others, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t thoughtfully listen and learn something very worthwhile and meaningful from their life journeys. I am also biased toward a notion that something far more complex and mysterious may be going on than our theories and beliefs can fully encompass. As ufologist Greg Bishop once said, “…it’s not only stranger than we think; it’s stranger than we can think.”

I feel that every experiencer, despite all of their different orientations, potentially hold significant clues and insights into the deeper and more profound meanings and implications of these strange phenomena.


Friday, March 29, 2024