Got a request about her. Has anyone done her genealogy? She now claims Choctaw as well as Cherokee.
There are some interesting reviews of her book.
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https://www.amazon.com/product-reviews/1933665726/ref=acr_dp_hist_2?ie=UTF8&filterByStar=two_star&reviewerType=all_reviews#reviews-filter-bar"Coffee Klatching the Aliens"
Reviewed in the United States on September 9, 2013
Verified Purchase
I try to avoid leaving negative reviews, but sometimes a book is so off-the-mark that it really needs to be flagged. I have a semi-professional interest in anthropological and socio-psychological aspects of so-called UFO phenomena. I purchased this book on AMAZON expecting a detailed account of ancient Star Elder myths (much like Jacques Valee & Chris Aubeck's WONDERS IN THE SKY). If that is what you are looking for, better keep looking; this book isn't it.
Be advised that this book relates almost exclusively incidents from the post-WWII to early-2000 period collected by the author while she apparently coffee-klatched her way around the reservations while on holiday from the Univ. of Montana. The only "mythic" material presented here are some vague allusions to how "Our Elders once knew the Star People" and similar off-hand generalizations.
People already familiar with published UFO lore will find nothing new in this book. In fact, much of the material seems to be merely so much rehash of classic cases, like the Betty and Barney Hill "missing time" incident of 1961 (better told in INTERRUPTED JOURNEY), and stories that quite frankly appear to be thinly disguised reiterations of certain plot elements from TWILIGHT ZONE and OUTER LIMITS episodes, films like INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS, and other well-circulated science-fiction stories in the wider public domain. Even the book's title ("ENCOUNTERS...") seems frankly derivative.
After reading the first three or four chapters, the monotonous regularity of the presentation, plodding quality of the prose style, and lack of memorable details in many of the recounted stories made the book a real effort to endure. (The author assures us she has at least a couple more books-worth of such collected material...onerous news at best.) Sadly, only one or two of the recounted incidents exhibit the uncanny hallmark of "high strangeness" which [the late] Dr. J. Allen Hynek identified as typifying the best "authentic" UFO encounters. In short, the presented material here is so bland that it actually becomes quite boring to read.
The book's back cover bio identifies the author as "a noted researcher" (a quick Google check revealed she is primarily a children's book author). Not surprisingly, the author's data gathering methodology, which involved presenting gift bags of groceries and/or cartons of cigarettes to her interview subjects and/or meeting them for lunch(!) doesn't strike the proper tone for how a real "noted researcher" conducts serious field interviews (..."Hey, aren't you the lady collecting stories for a book?"). Researcher bias, as you might expect under such circumstances, becomes a significant issue that contaminates the data.
Most significantly, there is no serious discussion of the reliability of her witnesses (some of whom even leave the distinct impression of having enjoyed putting-one-over on the Professor). The fact that so many of her interviews end with the note that "only [n]-months following this interview the subject unexpectedly passed-away" does nothing to inspire confidence in the data. Nor is there any examination of competing/prevailing scholarly interpretations of the phenomena; Six-Killer Clarke simply hasn't done her homework. At one point the author even makes the embarrassing mistake of confusing "psychopath" with "sociopath", an error that any undergrad Psych-major would know enough to avoid. Most laughably, one female subject [supposedly a former Air Force tech] who claimed to be a half-alien hybrid, lifted her blouse to show the author that her navel was missing. One can only ponder how that subject managed to sneak that one past the USAF's DOdMERB examiners during her service physicals!
In my opinion this book contributes virtually nothing of substantive research value to the serious study of UFO-related mythical lore as recounted by Native American persons from different tribal/language groups (i.e., diverse American Indians). Some readers (mostly younger, I suspect) may find the book has some minimal entertainment value. For that reason I gave the book two stars, mainly out of pity.
Somewhat Interesting But Not Credible, Has Inconsistencies
Reviewed in the United States on March 20, 2014
Verified Purchase
...If you're looking for "credible", this is not the book. I am not explicitly stating that the stories told by the author are absolutely not true. However, it's a fact that the author is presenting no evidence whatsoever to support her thesis. Without any evidence, these stories are just what they are: stories. Might be and might not be true. Who knows? Anyone can write a good story, but not everyone can assert the story and support it with credible evidence. I personally strongly believe in the existence of intelligent beings on other planets in the Universe - it would be a statistical IMPOSSIBILITY for other intelligent life in the Universe (besides human beings) NOT TO exist. (For anyone interested, I strongly suggest Carl Sagan's book "Cosmos" - which is a masterpiece in itself.) I understand the author's obligation of keeping the identity of her study subjects anonymous. But that is primarily what makes me doubt the authenticity of these stories. If she has no evidence, and no one can ever know the identities of these people, how can anyone ever believe any of her stories? Sorry, just not enough evidence for me. What I found particularly disturbing and incredulous is that - somehow - the subjects were able to VERBALLY communicate with the extra-terrestrials in a manner of a regular conversation. Please. What are the ODDS of the ET's speaking the subjects' language? What are the ODDS of an ET from a remote world, completely different from our own, who can actually speak any Earth language? That is - in fact - a statistical impossibility. So once again, it's an interesting book, but not a very credible one. As I've moved further and further into the next, and the next story, I've noticed many "lesser" inconsistencies throughout the book, which convinced me even more that there is a serious possibility that the author had made up these stories. Here is an EXPLICIT EXAMPLE: If you go to page 33 (The story of Ross meeting a small alien in an Alaskan blizzard), the author states that the name of Ross's driving partner is "BILL". Now, if you flip to page 36, she changes Ross's driving partner name to "ED". So is it BILL or ED? She also once reffers to the subject as "Russ" and not "Ross". So is it RUSS or ROSS? These kinds of little things, ya know. And it's usually the "little things that give you away". Please don't fall for these stories, and read a real UFO book instead.
