The front cover of the book 'The Flying Saucer Reader' edited by Jay David, featuring a dark brown cover with a silhouette of a flying saucer and large gold title text.
A printed acknowledgments and copyright page from a book, photographed against a light beige background. Visible text includes gratitude to Elaine Crane, copyright by Jay David, and publisher information for The New American Library and General Publishing Company, Ltd.
Back cover. A vintage-style sci-fi art print depicting a classic flying saucer UFO casting a beam of light down into a dark, atmospheric landscape with a red glow in the foreground.
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The front cover of the book 'The Flying Saucer Reader' edited by Jay David, featuring a dark brown cover with a silhouette of a flying saucer and large gold title text.A printed acknowledgments and copyright page from a book, photographed against a light beige background. Visible text includes gratitude to Elaine Crane, copyright by Jay David, and publisher information for The New American Library and General Publishing Company, Ltd.Back cover. A vintage-style sci-fi art print depicting a classic flying saucer UFO casting a beam of light down into a dark, atmospheric landscape with a red glow in the foreground.

the flying Saucer Reader

Debs Book Paradise
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Price:
$65.00

Description

Author/Editor: Jay David
Publisher: The New American Library
Place: New York
Year: 1967
Edition: First edition; no later printing indicated
Format: Hardcover with original dust jacket
Page Count: 256
Condition: Very Good hardcover in a Fair to Good original dust jacket. The book remains sound, with light age toning to the pages. The dust jacket has substantial edge wear, including chips, tears, creasing, rubbing, and areas of paper loss, particularly along the upper and lower edges. The jacket’s dramatic flying-saucer artwork remains striking and is now protected in a removable archival Brodart cover. Please review the photographs, which show the actual copy offered.

Description

Published during the formative years of modern UFO literature, The Flying Saucer Reader gathers notable reports, arguments, eyewitness accounts, and speculative writings about unidentified flying objects into a single historical anthology.

Editor Jay David draws from the work of prominent early UFO writers and investigators, including Major Donald E. Keyhoe and Harold T. Wilkins. The selections explore reported sightings, government secrecy, possible extraterrestrial contact, biblical interpretations, and the growing debate over whether flying saucers represented genuine unexplained phenomena.

The book also preserves the story of “World Contact Day,” the 1953 experiment in which members of the International Flying Saucer Bureau attempted to send a collective telepathic message to extraterrestrial visitors. That account later helped inspire the song “Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft,” first recorded by Klaatu and subsequently popularized by the Carpenters.

Why We Love This Book

This is more than a collection of UFO stories—it is a fascinating artifact from the period when flying saucers became a major part of American culture. Readers can encounter influential early accounts in their original historical context and see how reports of strange lights, alleged government secrecy, and possible extraterrestrial contact shaped the UFO literature that followed.