When I was a child, I was in love with the science fiction of that time. I used to read many books and watched all of the movies and TV series, most of which were still in black and white.
The books The Bermuda Triangle (1974) and The Mystery of Atlantis (1976), by Charles Berlitz, Chariots of the Gods? (1968), by Erich von Däniken, The Lost City of Mars (1975), by Ray Bradbury, and The Hollow Earth (1969), by Raymond Bernard, amongst many others, had a deep impact on me, as well as the TV series Lost in Space (1965-1968), Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (1966-1967) and The Jetsons (1962- 1987), and also movies such as The Andromeda Strain (1971), 2001: a Space Odyssey (1968) and Planet of the Apes (1968). These literary and audiovisual productions delighted me and made me travel through unimaginable worlds. Worlds of the Martians and Kryptonite.
The years have elapsed and, even though my curiosity has not diminished, the belief I had in flying sources has died completely.
In October 2017, when the A/2017 U1 asteroid was discovered, then renamed Oumuamua, I read, as I do every week, the article of the Brazilian astronomer Cássio Barbosa (10/27/2017) and it reminded me of the book Rendezvous with Rama (1973), by Arthur Clark, which was on my shelf. I reread this specific book and its sequels, almost forty years after the first reading, and, to my surprise, I started to believe once again in the possibility and even existence of flying saucers, as well as our coexistence with extraterrestrial beings.
This idea was becoming mature and, in December 2017, my friend and brother- in-law Luiz Ribeiro Soares visited me, he who, besides being a doctor, is a passionate amateur astronomer. It was in his house in New Jersey, in 1986, that I saw Saturn and its exuberant rings “live” for the first time through a potent telescope made of PVC tubes, lenses and lunettes that he himself had built. One word leads to another and I explained to Luiz that the visitation from extraterrestrial beings was totally feasible, and that probably, many of the apparitions registered since the visions of Ezequiel, present in the Old Testament, and even reports from the middle of the 20th century could and probably be true.
The story of this book is precisely an explanation on this possibility and is also hope for all those passionate about astronomy and science fiction.