Communion is Strieber's autobiographical accounts of his abductions and interactions with aliens. The book describes what he is convinced are real events spread over many years.
This was a disappointing addition to Strieber's body of work. He's an excellent horror author. I tried to imagine this as just another horror story by him with a false framing story for verisimilitude, despite knowing going in that he truly believes in the abductions and alien interactions described therein. I even have some old pictures of my father reading this and tried to think of it as a way of connecting back to his experiences as a reader. I couldn't do it. I couldn't take it seriously. What I'm sure was supposed to feel menacing felt silly, what was supposed to feel hopeful felt ludicrous. The recovered memory tropes don't work as we know in the field of psychology that they're virtually always fictitious. The conspiracy theories and paranoia come across as mentally ill.
I guess, if you consider yourself a survivor of these sorts of abductions you'll probably enjoy this. It just makes me feel sad for Strieber though. ( )

I enjoyed the style, the stories, and the theories presented. The way it was organized was a bit difficult for me to follow and I feel like I was missing some of the meaning. This might be why I never got fully sucked in. ( )

2nd edition ( )

8401373263

This is one of the strangest stories I have ever read. The strength of the book is the author takes a very logical and methodological approach to explain what happened to him. Was he visited, poked and prodded by alien visitors or not? The reader is left to his own conclusions. If nothing else, it is a good read except for the end where Strieber attempts to analyze what he went through. That portion is nearly unintelligible, but 90 percent of the book is highly readable. ( )