Budd Hopkins (1931–2011)

A landmark in the study of UFOs. Budd Hopkins presents us with five cases of people who believe they were abducted by aliens. Typically, they will spot a UFO and later realize that they cannot account for an hour or more of their time. They may think they watched a UFO for a few minutes, only to have a family member tell them they were missing for a much longer period of time.

Through hypnosis, these people are able to recover their 'missing time' and recount abductions by alien beings. These five cases are presented to the reader as transcriptions of the hypnotic sessions.

Whatever you think of UFOs or recovered memories, the accounts presented here make for fascinating reading. Each one is colored by the narrator's personality and quirks. Details will shift and metaphors will vary. But as you read through them you will notice startling similarities and patterns.

While I am skeptical myself (I think one of the cases presented here was a person suffering from sleep paralysis), there is the intriguing question: Just what did happen in that unaccounted for time?

That question and Budd's low-key, non-hyperbolic presentation made the book more credible to me. By all accounts he was a commercially successful artist with paintings in prestigious galleries and wealthy clients, so this book doesn't feel like a money-making or attention-grabbing scheme. He does not come off as a kook or a crack-pot.

In general, I find it easy to dismiss so much UFOlogy. The field is rife with hoaxes and even genuine cases are often just mistakes of perception (natural phenomena or the sleep paralysis I already mentioned). But until I read a thorough debunking of the cases presented here, Budd has me at least willing to accept that most of these stores *could* be true.… (mehr)