From New Page Books: Nick Redfern's Recent Visits from the Real Men in Black

Haven't received my copy yet, but soon! Can't wait, and I'm sure you can't either. In the meantime, here you go:
New Page Books: Recent Visits from the Real Men in Black

Torchwood Trailer: New Season/Incarnation

Thanks to UFO Casebook Frontier for this: trailer for the new "season" of Torchwood, the best, or at least, among the best (Fringe, X-Files and the original Outer Limits sharing the category) sci-fi/UFO/alien/paranormal shows. Torchwood, for those that don't know, is was a BBC program that aired on the BBC America channel. The last story arc was Children of Earth, absolutely the best story of the genre. If you haven't seen Children of Earth, make sure you do! The Torchwood series has been bought by STARZ, and will air Fridays starting in August. Many of the original characters are gone, but Captain Jack and Gwen are back, and they are the two main characters; without them, I don't know how it could really be Torchwood.
ALIEN, UFO CASEBOOK 'FRONTIER': Torchwood: Miracle Day - Trailer

Free Download: Flying Saucers Are Real

Donald Keyhoe's 1950 book Flying Saucers Are Real available for free; public domain: The Flying Saucers Are Real Cover art is classic!

USSR Did Roswell: Muddled Disclosures

Supposedly. Could be. In UFO World, anything is possible. Journalist Annie Jacobsen, author of Area 51, acknowledges there's definitely insidious and strange events going on in Area 51 and the UFO realm generally, but it's not aliens. (No, it could never be aliens.) Jacobsen and her book is currently making the mainstream circuit, including a recent appearance on Jon Stewart's The Daily Show. I knew before she came on that Stewart, who I adore, would mock any hint of alien/UFO reality, since it seems to be an affliction of the majority of the liberal-left-hip to sneer at fringe subjects. He didn't disappoint.

Jacobsen's contention is that yes, weirdness abounds but it's not aliens. It's the USSR and Nazi experiments behind the Roswell crash. And so much more, but all of these strange events have been orchestrated by humans. ET has nothing to do it, nor cryptids or vortexes or magick or anything other than human Dr. Evils.

Jacobsen has interesting ideas about what on, but there's no proof. As is admitted by everyone, but that seems to be all right, for Jacobsen is a legitimate journalist and not some tin-foil hat wearing conspiracy theorist:

Still, lack of proof hasn't exactly stopped the book from sparking speculation on the media circuit and on the Web. In the last day, Yahoo! searches skyrocketed 3,000 percent for "area 51 book." And the tome is penned not by a crackpot conspirator, but a respected journalist.

I'm impatient and cynical with this distracting crap, because it's muddled disinfo. (Which is probably an oxymoron.) Jacobsen's story gets attention, while all the other UFO stories, including abduction stories sans Nazi bastards-Dr. Evils-government experiments, continue to go utterly ignored, utterly mocked. Meanwhile, journalists, writers, researchers, scientists -- those "respected journalists" and the like --  who know nothing of the esoteric world yet decide to take a swim in the sparkling waters for a look-see are blind to what they consider nonsense. They come out with one small bit, show it off as the latest in theory, and happily go back to their rational worlds. Everyone thinks something groovy-weird has just been revealed, and all has been solved: including the "nonsense" of UFOs. Because, as has just been proven, no such things exist. It was really Russia, or Nazis, or ...

We're not done yet. The fact is, there very well could be some truth to these theories. Nick Redfern's book Bodysnatchers in the Desert  brought explored the idea of human experiments and manipulations as the cause for Roswell. MILABS are a very real possibility, and some UFO witnesses and researchers have been writing about this for a long time. Ironically, among UFO researchers, the MILAB "conspiracy" doesn't get much attention.

It's not that Jacobsen's story couldn't be true, or, some of it could be true...it's that once again, our attention from the reality of the UFO phenomena is trivialized and further pushed out to the edges. UFOs, the mainstream continues to insist, are entertaining and fun funny, but they're not real.

If Jacobsen's contentions somehow prove to be valid, (and/or Redfern's, etc.) that is horrifying, and the world needs to know. But what will happen in that event is that the many will accept that as the explanation for all of "it." Once again, we go back to clean dichotomies, something both the mainstream and many within UFOlgy are guilty of enacting.  It has to be this theory or that theory,  it's all aliens or it's all human psychopaths.

As I said, I'm impatient with this mainstream UFO denying stuff, but Nick Redfern has a calmer take on Jacobsen's book, giving us a bit of  background and data that is helpful, even if it does push us further down the rabbit hole. (Once you've fallen in, you just keep falling...:) You can read his review here.

Book Review: Insight

I just finished reading Insight, the young adult/juvenile fiction novel by Diana Greenwood. When I agreed to review the book I hadn't realized it is a "Christian" novel. I normally wouldn't read something in that category, but, I was sent the book and so I read it. I'm glad I did.

Insight is, first of all, well written, keeping within the classic coming of age genre. "Vira," (Elvira) the young girl, struggles with an emotionally distant mother and grandmother, and the disappearance of her father in late 1940s America.  Reasons for these: the fighting and hardness of mother and grandmother, the absent father, are due to many factors, including alcoholism and poverty.  And then, a sibling comes along, one who has psychic abilities that changes the direction of this emotionally damaged family.

Vira's mother decides to move across the country, and it is during this move that Vira discovers many things about not only herself, but her mother and grandmother. Throughout, Vira grieves for her father and the guilt she suffers surrounding his disappearance. 

Vira's sister continues to startle her family and those around her with her abrupt visions, culminating in what I found to be an unexpected yet satisfying end. The ending is a realistic one, and the term "realistic" might seem odd given the aura of supernatural presences, yet Greenwood weaves together the everydayness of life with something "other" in a seamless and satisfying way.

The Christian message is a universal one: the power of love and forgiveness. I am not a Christian, but I can't argue with that message at all. There isn't any preachiness or over the top fundamentalist religious message in this book.

Insight is a good read, and a good story. If you're not inclined to read religious type books don't let that stop you from reading Insight.

Wake Up Now! UFO Conference

Lesley Gunter reports on her involvement with the first Wake Up Now! conference in New Mexico for her Grey Matters column at Binnall of America. (Wish I could have been there!) Read about it here: grey matters

The Real Men in Black: The Real Men in Black: Coming June 16

Pre-order Nick Redfern's newest, due out in June: The Real Men in Black.
The Real Men in Black: The Real Men in Black: Coming June 16

Nick Redfern's "There's Something in the Woods...": The Inhumanoids - Published!

OOOoooo, but this looks good! Bart Nunnelly's The Inhumanoids. It is on my list! Nick Redfern wrote the introduction, and you can read more about the book here: Nick Redfern's "There's Something in the Woods...": The Inhumanoids - Published!

Tessa Dick Presents: It's a Philip K. Dick World!: My memoir is available now!

Tessa Dick's newest, read how to order here:

Tessa Dick Presents: It's a Philip K. Dick World!: My memoir is available now!