Vacationers from Outer Space by Edward Valfre

From the Publisher

While traveling in his family's sedan "spaceship," an imaginative Backseat Buckaroo decodes alien messages, witnesses a high-speed flying saucer chase, and saves the planet Earth.

Publishers Weekly

Photographer Valfre, who chronicled a cross-country drive in Backseat Buckaroo, takes his camera on another family road trip. Humans aren't alone on the highway, however; a "flying saucer" sails through a diner, and a plastic "robot scout" detects aliens. Dramatic duotone photos introduce the narrator, a boy "space buckaroo" wearing a plastic astronaut's helmet and standing in a rocky landscape. "When faced with invasion from outer space," the hero says, "Save planet Earth and try not to get too dirty." Yet the aliensrepresented by kitschy ceramic statuettesmean no harm. Apparently, TV signals in space have given Earth a reputation as "one of the greatest amusement parks in the galaxy." The tale ends on a philosophical note ("The whole universe is on one big journey to nobody knows where") that speaks to vacationers from all galaxies. Valfre displays a quirky, adult sensibility: his photos, with their murky blue-black and white contrast, resemble a spaghetti-western "night" scene shot through a filter in broad daylight; ominous clouds rush through a dark sky, and a Milky Way of thick cream spins in a cup of black coffee. Acid-green and electric-blue pages, sprinkled with stars and clip-art UFOs, also appeal to retro tastes. This surreal travelogue, atmospheric and fashionably designed, will captivate grown-up fans of Americanabut it's meant for the whole (post-) nuclear family. Ages 4-up. (Dec.)

Children's Literature

This is a book parents will enjoy as much, and perhaps even more, than their young children. Many of us will remember taking vacations with our own parents, trapped in the backseat of the car with nothing but our own imaginations for amusement. Edward Valfre used his imagination to fire up this story of an adventure with aliens. Every reader will put himself in the place of the child who transforms himself into a space buckeroo while stuck in the back seat on a long ride to an isolated observatory in the mountains. When the "deadly space orbs" are in hot pursuit of the spaceship, which looks a lot like a family sedan, the space buckeroo hits the hyperdrive button which, strangely enough, also tunes in a country-western radio station. Many of the author's photographs are of unusual or bizarre roadside attractions, but others are of ordinary sights turned into something astonishing by imaginative photography.

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