My favorite thing about this book is that it’s co-authored. There’s something about a co-authoring that lends a certain type of gravitas, of scholarliness to a work. When applied to paranormal activity in the USSR such sobriety is utterly delightful.
This solemn learnedness continues within as Ion Hobana and Julien Weverbergh explore the origins of UFO sightings within early Christian writings and art, particularly the 14th Century frescoes at the Autonomous Monastic State of Mount Athos that depict space vessels accompanying the crucification of Christ.
They continue on into the present, or what was the present then, with all the authority of charts and graphs.
And even “real” images from NASA.
And of course there are the necessary first hand accounts with accompanying grainy photographs that are never ascribed to anyone in particular.
It’s hard to know whether these authors believed what they wrote or were simply capitalizing on stacked fears of the unknown. But I’d like to think they were paranoid believers.
Regardless, I find it interesting that UFO sitings are most frequent at moments in history when the human civilization seems at an end. The 14th Century, when the space pods appeared in the frescoes at Mount Athos, was marked by a steady stream of political and natural disasters in Europe, the Mongolian Empire, and China.
The decade in which this book was written and published saw the 1968 moon landing, antiwar riots in the world over, and unending concern over nuclear winter.
Now, as we head into our own era’s challenge to prevent total annihilation, climate change, I find it no surprise that aliens are again the topic of popular discussion, lately appearing in such reputable news outlets as the New York Times and the BBC. But, if such entities do exist, I would kindly ask they share their fuel source, which is likely renewable and/or incredibly efficient given the long distances they’ve traveled.
Lorissa Rinehart 