A Review of HIM: After the UFO Crash by Koos Verkaik

Two years ago, I virtually met the author Koos Verkaik when he had read my blog in the Netherlands and reached out to me to interview him for his book The Dance of the Jester. And most recently he reached out again for me to review his book HIM: After the UFO Crash which has been contracted by Three Corners Entertainment for film. So, I feel honored to be selected as a reader of this multi-layered, highly detailed and complex sci-fi novel with various twists and turns.

My interest was piqued because I’m a big X-Files fan---love Mulder and Scully and yes, I do believe the “truth is out there.” Anyway, the big question this novel poses is “What does a thief, a transient, a handyman/builder, a psychiatrist, and a rocket scientist have in common?”  And the response after reading and putting together the various storylines is one word…synchronicity. 

The novel takes place in the 1960s and opens with two strangers meeting in Paris at a bistro called La Gargouille that was being renovated.  Jasper Froch is an American from Ohio, a traveling Bohemian, and a thief. Antoine Faverel, is a mathematician who lost his job at a big insurance company in Marseilles, his wife and all his money and is now a middle-aged transient living on the streets. Antoine introduces the concept of synchronicity to Jasper which he says means “simultaneity.” Jasper is taken by this concept and now has a heightened sense of simultaneity – observing things happening for a reason around him.

Next readers meet Nicole Ginella in Miami. She worked with Arthur Croft, a scientist at Scorpius Special Systems up until his “sudden, self-inflicted death.”  Nicole is suspicious of Arthur’s death and only trusts a fellow scientist who goes by the name “Bird.”  Nicole is approached by the CIA to find out what Arthur was working on before he died. But she is smart enough not to divulge anything.

While readers are soaking up Nicole’s story, we meet Leon Benjamin Turner who “carried his tools—hammers, pincers, saws, nails, screwdrivers, gimlet—in a big, heavy rucksack” and his wife, Florence living in the small town of Sanguine, Florida. This town has been plagued with hurricanes that has destroyed many homes there, yet, Leon is determined to stay.  

Then there’s Mike and Irene Rees who were surprised by a tornado on their way home to Atlanta, Georgia. They got lost and ended up in Sanguine where they see a UFO crash behind the school. Mike took some photos but they were confiscated by the police. Suddenly, army trucks began to enter Sanguine and for years things and the people there were never the same after HIM (the UFO) gave them enhanced power and knowledge.

Jasper is now in Switzerland where he meets Felix Hartman, a psychiatrist who offers him a job at a psych institution. Not only is Jasper to fix things around the complex, but he was tasked to get an American patient to talk whom no one can seem to get through to.

This story picks up steam and culminates in Florida and Jasper comes full circle when he returns to Paris and seeks out Antoine. So, without giving anything away, I simply have to say WOW! I thoroughly enjoyed the story. Two thumbs way up for Koos! He did an excellent in bringing all the storylines together into an ending that makes you wonder about intelligent life and how we are affected by it.

Side note: I’ve had many moments of synchronicity but I simply chalk them up to coincidences. But sometimes, the universe has a way of connecting some of these moments that make me pause. After reading this novel, I’ll be more attuned to calling it what it truly is…synchronicity.

Some of my favorite lines:

“Well, do you have an explanation?”

“I do. Have you ever heard of synchronicity?”

Jasper shook his head. “No.”

“You know … This is so exciting! I should be drunk by now, but I feel completely sober.” Antoine stood up and walked, without reeling, past the bottles. He stooped, picked one up and read the label. “What did I tell you? A French wine, an excellent Bordeaux!” He lay down on the couch and grabbed the coat to use as a blanket. “No, I won’t fall asleep. I’ll even wait a while before I open this bottle.”

Jasper leaned forward. Antoine had his full attention.

“Synchronicity, Jasper Froch,” Antoine continued, “synchronicity. It literally means simultaneity. An intriguing phenomena! A marvelous coincidence. Two events that apparently have nothing to do with each other and of which the one is absolutely not the result of the other, give one food for thought! Many people see it as an important warning or a sign. It was the famous Swiss psychiatrist Carl Gustav Jung who came up with the term and studied the phenomena. Synchronicity is unexplainable, elusive; it’s simply beyond us. I just gave you examples, experiences from your own life: you mention a falcon, I see one; you talk about getting pushed by the storm, and a storm splashes rain against the windows; you mention the Rhine River, and I pick up a bottle of Rhine wine. You think of a novel by Poe, open a book at random and read all about it on that particular page."

Rating: 5 Stars