Customer Reviews

The Interrupted Journey

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I had heard about the Hill's experience many, many years ago and I often wondered if it was really true what happened to them. My own personal opinion now, after reading this book, is that it did indeed happen.I could not turn the pages fast enough. There is no way that two people could have such intricate details of an event like that and be making it up. Surely someone along the way would have seen through them. I lived in the White Mountains for a few years and being familiar with the area of occurrence made the book an even better read. The Hill's are intelligent and educated, their story is one of a kind. If you don't believe now, you will after you read this book. If the tops of your shoes get scuffed and you don't know how they got that way, you'd better check your watch !

"The Interrupted Journey" is a fascinating story based upon the experiences of Betty and Barney Hill, two alleged UFO abductees in 1962. The Hills did not have memories of the abduction, but there was a space of lost time after they saw some strange lights in the sky.

Betty and Barney were troubled by this lost time and were experiencing anxiety and stress since that trip. They had reported the lights that they saw in the sky to the US Air Force, who seemed to take report seriously. Finally they consulted a psychiatrist who began to conduct hypnosis sessions with the Hills. They were treated separately and the sessions were taped. Betty and Barney detailed the horrifying yet exciting circumstance of being abducted by aliens and undergoing physical exams. The therapy was successful in treating symptoms and helped ease the suppressed memories into their consciousness.

This book uses long quotes from the original transcripts of the hypnosis sessions. This device is highly successful in captivating the reader and giving a sense of the emotions experienced by the Hills both during the abduction and during the therapy. Fuller does a nice job bringing to life this bi-racial, middle-class couple who were prominent in the Civil Rights movement. Betty and Barney Hill's story was made into an excellent movie called "The UFO Incident" starring a young James Earl Jones with Estelle Parsons in 1975.

"The Interrupted Journey" is a very convincing account of an alien encounter. Despite the fact that the details of the abduction are fairly routine, it is an eerie story with some psychological complexity that makes for good reading. Fuller's writing can be a little stiff at times but he does a good job of allowing the character's actions to speak for themselves. Highly recommended!

I read the first edition of "The Interrupted Journey" published in 1966 by Berkeley Medallion Books, written by John G. Fuller, with a very brief intro by Dr. Benjamin Simon (one of the very first doctors to treat Barney and Eunice Hill). The book is a total of 350 pages long and includes many pictures which offer up a detailed view of the story, even by today's book publishing standards. Also, it's important to mention that this book included the full cooperation of Mr. and Mrs. Hill.

"The Interrupted Journey" is both fascinating and mind-boggling because it's truly the very first story of an alien abduction of victims that were able to provide details through memory-regression and hypnosis.

The book is fascinating because it actually includes the full and unedited hypnosis transcripts with Mr. and Mrs. Hill. This makes up the overwhelming majority of the book. The rest of the book describes how the circumstance affected them and what they did to not only get their story out but to also find help for themselves.

I also like this book because it doesn't include any unnecessary information. Everything in "The Interrupted Journey" revolves around Eunice and Barney's abduction. Some of the language, wording and phrases sounded somewhat odd and dated but what can you expected with a book written more than 40 years ago?

Anyone that is interested in UFOlogy should make it a policy to read this book. You will not be disappointed. The story is absolutely shocking.

One of the classic UFO stories - Lacks substantial critical investigation, so well done in later UFO books - Dated and repetitive - Convincing despite its innocence - A must for all ufoligists

One of the classic UFO stories - Lacks substantial critical investigation, so well done in later UFO books - Dated and repetitive - A must for all ufoligists

The Betty and Barney Hill case is truly the mother of all alien abduction stories; not only was it the first complete account of alien abduction, it remains one of the most well-documented cases on record. The Hills were not publicity seekers (as an interracial couple in 1964, the last thing they needed was more attention), and the medical psychiatrist who eventually hypnotized them had no interest in ufology whatsoever - in fact, Dr. Simon Hill maintained strict editorial control over the contents of this book, particularly pertaining to his medical observations and the regression session transcripts, and he also penned the forward in an effort to further separate himself from a literal interpretation of the Hills' story. Back then, alien abduction was too wild to even consider a possibility. As active participants in their community, Barney and Betty had nothing to gain - and everything to lose - by going public (and they did so only after their story was leaked to a reporter), making The Interrupted Journey a tribute to their courage as well as a record of the extraordinary event that haunted them for the rest of their lives.

On the night of September 19, 1961, while driving home from vacation through the White Mountains of New Hampshire, the Hills spotted a strange object in the sky, a light that seemed to follow them on the desolate road. They stopped several times to view the object through binoculars but could not identify it. Whereas Betty's curiosity was greatly aroused by the mystery object, Barney repeatedly attempted to explain it away as nothing out of the ordinary. After getting out of the car and making his way into a field to get a better view of the object, Barney suddenly ran back to the car, exclaiming that they had to leave before they were captured. A short time later, they heard a series of beeps; the next thing they remembered were a second series of beeps, at which time they found themselves some thirty-five miles down the road. Everything in between the series of beeps was a complete haze in their minds. Shaking off the experience, they arrived home some two hours later than expected.

In the weeks and months following this sighting, both of the Hills began experiencing psychological and physiological problems. Betty began having vivid nightmares of the night of the sighting, while Barney's anxiety increased and an ulcer flared up. Tracing the source of their rising anxiety back to the night of September 19, 1961, they were eventually referred to psychiatrist Dr. Benjamin Simon, who set out to unlock their amnesiac period of that night via hypnosis. What emerged from those sessions was an extraordinary account of being abducted by aliens, subjected to a series of medical tests aboard their craft, and having their memories tampered with so they would not consciously remember what happened.

Dr. Simon had no interest whatsoever in UFOs and sought to explain the source of their mutually corroborating accounts of alien abduction as some type of dream transference - but he certainly believed that the Hills' regression testimonies were sincere. His main concern, naturally, was in helping the couple relieve their anxiety, and he was successful in doing so. Over the next couple of years, the Hills went on to discuss their story with family and friends - and the story would probably end there if a Boston journalist hadn't found out about it and published an article about it - against the Hills' strong wishes. That opened the floodgates, of course, leading to the Hills' decision to go public in the form of this book by John G. Fuller.

Aside from its historical importance, The Interrupted Journey is a pretty darn interesting read. Whatever happened to them, the Hills were an extraordinary couple, and the story they tell differs in a number of ways from the standard abduction account as we've come to know it today - and since there were really no other cases to compare it with at the time, the author had no real agenda apart from letting the Hills tell their story in their own words, much of it straight from the regression session transcripts.

This book is critical to any study of UFOs and abductions. It is important to note that this occured in 1961 and that the very idea of abduction wasn't even on the radar. So while it is plausable that many of the abductions of today could be influenced by books and movies, it wasn't an issue then. So here we have what most scholars call the only "untainted" case. The writing style and approach definitely reflects the time it was written in and that is part of it's charm to me. I still read my copy printed in the time it originally came out.