For me, the appeal of Speculative Fiction is the breadth and depth of its scope. An author is free to explore the most difficult questions and imagine worlds vastly different from anything we have ever experienced. Though all literature is concerned with what it means to be human, few outside of Sci Fi go to such lengths to ask what it means to be capable of thought and self-knowledge However, there is a drawback.
Often, authors succumb to the temptation to create a world so new, so different, so For me, the appeal of Speculative Fiction is the breadth and depth of its scope.
Often, authors succumb to the temptation to create a world so new, so different, so complex, and so vast that it becomes almost impossible to write it. Farmer has selected too vast a canvas, too great a scene, and so the small if engaging story he paints upon it seems a far cry from the overarching premise.
Farmer creates an artificial afterlife, one containing every human being ever born. By using the old Sci Fi trick of 'science did it', he avoids the knee-jerk response many people would have to a book making overt spiritual claims.
Since everyone was just recreated by aliens, Farmer is not technically a blasphemer. Everyone is there; even, as the book jacket likes to point out, 'you! Farmer has the grandest possible cast of characters, and does not waste it.
His protagonists, their friends, and their enemies are plucked from the greatest and most notorious men in history as well as Farmer himself.
However, we are struck with an immediate difficulty: Farmer is trying to write some of the most remarkable people in history. Unfortunately for Farmer, many of his characters' real-life counterparts were brilliant, eccentric men. Since they are more brilliant and eccentric than Farmer himself, we end up with fairly standard protagonists saddled with famous names.
For example, he chooses one of the most remarkable men of a remarkable period, Sir Richard Burton. In a time of colonial adventurers, he was one of the greatest and most notorious.
He was one of the most adroit swordfighters of his day and braved and escaped death numerous times over his remarkably long career. He was also a polyglot who knew some thirty languages, making him an extremely convenient hero for a book taking place on a world where every culture was rubbing elbows with every other. He also nearly discovered the source of the Nile, giving him a thematic connection to this 'Riverworld'.
In short he was a real-life hero, straight out of an adventure story. However, he was also a refined and educated man who made a full and unabridged translation of the 1, Arabian Nights. Though Farmer's version of Burton is as capable and impressive as we might expect, he does not have Burton's singular and remarkable personality. Perhaps it was wise of Farmer to pick a man so clearly suited to play the role of the adventure hero. Many authors have tried to create adventure heroes out of small and inexperienced men.
However, in this case, Farmer has thrown his net too far, and caught too large a fish for his dinner. Farmer experiences a similar problem with all of the myriad cultures he writes. Since he is not a historical expert on any of these cultures, their portrayal tends to be rather unremarkable, such that as we travel along the river, we find Victorian Gentlemen, Dakota Indians, and Chinese Marauders are more or less interchangeable.
Beyond this, their interaction with one another becomes likewise simplified. It would be a remarkable feat for any author to be able to write such interactions as might occur between Sumerians and Olmecs, but this hardly excuses Farmer; after all, he was the one who chose to write this book.
Farmer took his inspiration from Edgar Rice Burroughs, who also had a mysterious and mystical river in his John Carter of Mars series. However, Farmer might have taken another lesson from Burroughs. When Burroughs wrote of strange Martian cultures, he could create as he liked without any need for research or knowledge.
However, we can see by the wild inaccuracies of his 'Tarzan' that he probably should have stuck with aliens. Likewise, if Farmer's book had been about his own made up cultures, there would be little to fault him. However, since he chose such a difficult path himself, I feel no compunction in stating that he was unequal to the challenge. The book is exciting, adventurous, and the writing is not without grace, but it is certainly not what it would promise to be.
The next book in the series is worse, with a hackneyed, unfunny Mark Twain taking center stage. View all 7 comments. Apr 01, TK rated it it was amazing Shelves: sci-fi. You wake up on a beach I am simplifying here for those of that have not read this—the book does not start off on a beach , next to a river that is endless.
You have no recollection of this place. You know this can't be possible because next to you are a man dressed in 16th century attire and a bit further down from him is what looks like a Neanderthal. But, hey, you're in a Philip Jose Farmer novel, so anything's possible. I love the concept that when we die regardless of what time period we died in we are all sent to a world with a massive river cutting it in half and are dependant upon mystical orbs to get food and other necessities.
But what really works for me is the realization Farmer had that in some way man will still try to develop a power structure. Add the fact that war and politics and everything associated with the two are still present and you get what could plausibly be best described as earth. And who doesn't want to read about Richard Burton or Mark Twain in the afterlife? Though I do have issues with Farmer's writing style the story more than makes up for this.
View all 8 comments. Jun 05, lark benobi rated it did not like it Shelves: male-identified-authors , amazingly-goodstar-reads. I was really put off by its misogyny, its bullheaded masculinity, its eurocentrism. Like much science fiction, it simply can't escape the stale assumptions of its time.
These problems do make the book an interesting read on another level. At least I can see how far we've come. But I also wish someone would write an alternative vision, a book that would have the same kind of wonderful, playful, pan-historical mish-mosh of characters, but that would not have the same unpleasant philosophical limit I was really put off by its misogyny, its bullheaded masculinity, its eurocentrism.
But I also wish someone would write an alternative vision, a book that would have the same kind of wonderful, playful, pan-historical mish-mosh of characters, but that would not have the same unpleasant philosophical limitations of Farmer's Riverworld. Here is an small example from the book of the kind of thing that made me do a double-take on nearly every page, even though these probably didn't bother me at all when I read the book in high school: "Know a man's faith, and you knew at least half the man.
Know his wife, and you knew the other half. In particular, the female characters in this book are convenient props for sex, quickly abandoned by the story and never thought of again by the overwhelmingly male cast of characters.
I don't think it's much of a spoiler to say the book contains famous historical characters Sometimes I mourn the loss of those times when I could delude myself and pretend that I was part of the mass of readers being addressed in phrases like "know the man It's worth contemplating such things, just as it's worth reading this book, however maddening an experience it may be to some of us readers who don't fit the mold.
View all 3 comments. May 03, Bettie rated it it was amazing Shelves: re-visit , sci-fi , spring , recreational-drugs , character-growth , casual-violence , paper-read , nowt-as-queer-as-folk , epic-proportions , look-behind-you. Engler Burton's battle with the F-icles is a fantastic adventure story and the excitement stood the test of time with this re-visit. Looking forward to the second book where Mark Twain is a major player, if my memory serves me right.
How lucky I was as a young woman, there was so much to grab and follow - this series, Donaldson's, Eddings's and the beginning of PTerry's ouevre. It was this very book that introduced me to Burton, and I've enjoyed reading about the lives of the explorers ever since.
Dec 29, Kat Hooper rated it really liked it Shelves: audiobook. But he was totally bewildered by what actually happened. He woke up young, hairless, naked, and turning in midair as if on a spit in the middle of 37 billion other young, hairless, naked and rotating humans. Soon after waking, the bodies — all the people over the age of five who had ever lived — plunged to the ground and began their new lives together in a giant river valley Is this Heaven, Hell, Purgatory, or is it some huge social experiment being run by aliens?
Most of the humans, happy that their basic needs are being met, are content to just be living again. Some people see this as an opportunity to seize the power and wealth that they had, or never obtained, on Earth. He seems to be the only person who got a glimpse behind the scenes of their new home and, not only does he resent being manipulated, but his curiosity is insatiable. So, he and a few companions set out to explore the Riverworld and, they hope, to discover the source of the river and find some answers.
Richard Francis Burton, a fascinating and scandalous man in real life, is the perfect character to explore the Riverworld. The best aspect of To Your Scattered Bodies Go is its original premise — the idea of all of humanity spread out, generally in chronological order, along a giant river which can be traveled, like a human timeline. If someone dies in the Riverworld, they are resurrected at random somewhere along the river. To Your Scattered Bodies Go, written in , is creative, exciting, fast-paced, and totally absorbing.
I was completely enthralled from the first page to the last. I read this many years ago, but never wanted to read any more in the series. It's certainly open ended enough that I should want to continue, but I don't - again. It starts off with a great idea. Everyone is reborn into their body at their prime. The characters are really interesting. It wasn't. Also an interesting premise, but he didn't expand on it enough to really capture me.
All in all, the whole book seemed like a lot of great opportunities lost. Again, I don't think I'll continue reading the series. Sep 28, Althea Ann rated it did not like it. Usually, the Hugo Awards are a good recommendation for entertaining literature.
Not in this case. I really don't understand how this book could have been given an award of any kind. Were there NO other sf novels published in ? Farmer uses historical figures as his characters as an excuse to not bother writing any characterization of any kind. Every character in the novel is completely two-dimensional. It's pretty hard to make such an interesting and multi-dimensional character as the historica Usually, the Hugo Awards are a good recommendation for entertaining literature.
It's pretty hard to make such an interesting and multi-dimensional character as the historical Richard Burton dull and flat - but Farmer manages it. Moreover, the book is offensively, insidiously sexist. By which I don't mean that, in the grand tradition of adventure stories, that lusty buxom babes abound! Rather, I mean that not one female character in the book displays any initiative, independence, or intelligence.
Men regard them as property, and women's only instinct seems to be to find a male "protector. Women are only an accessory to a man, to be admired physically, used sexually, and then tired of. Here's one direct quote: "She was the product of her society - like all women, she was what men had made her.
Sexist stereotypes are not the only ones found In a world supposedly populated with people of all cultures, time periods, and places, everything seems to run in a remarkably Eurocentric manner. To regard cigars as a universal luxury item is particularly bemusing. Still, all this would be excusable, if only the story was fun, exciting and interesting. Not so. For such a short p. I fell asleep on it last night, and finished it this afternoon out of some sort of sense of obligation.
I think I'll be sending the copy of World of Tiers on my to-read shelf straight to the recycle bin. Nov 03, Maggie K rated it liked it Shelves: sci-fi-masterworks , wwe-grandmaster-challenge. The one sentence version: Great idea, bad execution I LOVE the idea of a world where everyone who ever existed is suddenly reesurrected and given a second chance However, it seems like it never gets too developed from an idea into a story, and using real-life people as characters When the main character Richard Burton goes after Alice Hargreaves Alice in Wonderland it seems more like a peek at the author's own The one sentence version: Great idea, bad execution When the main character Richard Burton goes after Alice Hargreaves Alice in Wonderland it seems more like a peek at the author's own Id than anything else I do like to read about historical figures, but if too many 'liberties' are taken with their personalities, well, it rankles the reader.
It did end up becoming a story in the last couple chapters, definitely set up for the next in the series. Mar 21, Shawn Deal rated it really liked it Shelves: sci-fi. There is really a lot to love in this book. First--the inventive idea of coming back to life on a foreign planet with everyone else who has ever lived. Second--now all the characters must live with each other and other hsitorical figures, how does one get along with so many different people displaced from time.
Third--just survival on a foreign planet. There is a lot to wrap your mind around in this book, especially when it comes to social interaction with various kinds of people and characters. I found it fascinating and really got to thinking about how it could really be and what if you met some of the true heros and villains throughout history. Written in , this book does show its age a bit around the edges, but for the most part holds up well. Nov 24, Malum rated it really liked it Shelves: science-fiction.
In this novel, primitives, Nazis, aliens, monsters, the mysterious overlords of the Riverworld, and others from all t Anybody remember that Milton Bradley game Heroscape, where people from all times, places, and universes Samurai, Vikings, WWII soldiers, monsters, etc. In this novel, primitives, Nazis, aliens, monsters, the mysterious overlords of the Riverworld, and others from all times and places Earthly and otherwise , all duke it out in a post-apocalyptic afterlife where even death isn't an escape.
Thrown into the middle of this mess is Sir Richard Burton yes, that Sir Richard Burton , whose linguistic, fighting, and survival skills are particularly helpful in this strange world, especially when he is confronted by Hermann Goering yes, that Hermann Goering.
This is one of the weirdest and most imaginative sci-fi stories I have come across and highly recommended if you are looking for something really different. Mar 19, Rose rated it liked it Shelves: science-fiction. I loved the concept behind this book more than the story itself. It was good but it could have been much better. The idea of millions of people, spanning the globe and human history, waking beside each other was fantastic.
Then to learn that they were deliberately brought together was even more fascinating. But then there was the story itself. Oct 25, Stephen rated it really liked it Shelves: easton-press , award-winner-hugo , sf-alien-planets-and-societies , award-nominee-hugo , multiple-award-nominee , sf-adventures-investigations-and-mi , award-nominee-locus.
Excellent novel by one of the under-rated masters of science ficiton. Great, original concept and a well-written plot. Sir Richard Francis Burton is a Dick. Mar 30, Amy rated it it was amazing Shelves: made-into-a-movie , speculative-fiction , books-read , fantasy , life-after-death.
Imagine that you wake up and the last thing that you remember is dying. You're lying on a riverbank surrounded by strangers who are naked and hairless just as you are. As you explore your surroundings, you find that you are no longer on Earth and the people around you are all the people from the beginning of time who have lived and died on Earth. Furthermore, there are no animals or insects, but there are plenty of fish in a river that seems never never to end.
Meals and wants like cigarettes, a Imagine that you wake up and the last thing that you remember is dying. Meals and wants like cigarettes, alcohol, and clothing are provided daily from unseen benefactors. The main character of the story is Richard Francis Burton, a famous British explorer from the last half of the s.
He's the perfect character to follow around in such a world because of his wide acquaintance with various cultures and ability to speak 29 different languages. When my husband mentioned the premise of this series to me, I knew I had to read it. He also said that it's going to be a 4-hour movie event on the SyFy channel. Unfortunately, Richard Burton isn't going to be the main character because they were worried that Americans would think of the wrong Richard Burton -- the one that was an actor and Elizabeth Taylor's husband.
Are we really so dumb that we couldn't differentiate between a little-known actor and a well-known explorer? Some other things that I bet won't make it into the series are people waking up naked and hairless, marijuana and hallucinates, lots of suicides, lots of love and war, and people's questioning of their religion since the afterlife is different than they were told. Oh, what am I talking about? I'm sure they'll show war. That at least is socially acceptable on television. While the first book gives a small idea of who created Riverworld and why everyone is there, it still leaves enough questions unanswered that I'm curious about.
As for the television series, I'm not nearly as optimistic about it. View all 4 comments. Feb 12, Nancy Oakes rated it really liked it Shelves: sci-fi-fantasy. First, a word of warning: do NOT expect to know the answers to the questions you're going to have by the end of this book. They aren't there. So if you read this book, get to the end of it and say "this stinks!
There's no resolution! I hate this book," don't say I didn't warn you! The book isn't about finding the answers And if by the end of the book you don't have any questions, you need to go back and read it again because your curiousity should be absolutely on First, a word of warning: do NOT expect to know the answers to the questions you're going to have by the end of this book. And if by the end of the book you don't have any questions, you need to go back and read it again because your curiousity should be absolutely on fire!
Second, if you are a hardcore Christian, this book just might bother you enough because of the subjects it deals with. Remember: it's Fiction! This novel is the first of the Riverworld Series, in which the reader is introduced to the Riverworld, so called because its main feature is a continuous river that doesn't seem to end.
The main character is a real character, here in his fictional garb, the explorer Sir Richard Burton. One moment, he's laying in the arms of his wife, dying; the next moment, he's floating among countless numbers of sleeping people, the only one awake until he sees a canoe with strange markings floating toward him, carrying humans in it, who put him back to sleep. Shortly thereafter, he wakes up, buck naked, his mustache his pride and joy gone, along with all of his hair in fact, with only a cylinder attached to him.
As he awakens, he realizes there are others there as well, all in the same condition. Eventually he comes to realize that they have all at some point, died, either before him or after him. All told, every single human being that ever lived on the Earth at any moment in its history are there in the Riverworld, resurrected, it seems.
At first the main problems are seeking shelter and safety; afterwards, Burton is not content to simply accept his fate, but the explorer in him wants to get a boat onto the river and follow it wherever it leads and to see what lies beyond. What he finds is not pretty: it seems that people are just repeating their old bad human-nature habits.
His real quest, however, is to find the who, the how and the why behind this massive resurrection. I guess what amazed me about this book was the idea that humans are humans no matter what the situation, time, place, whatever. And while I didn't always like Burton's character, the author did an amazing job with the creation of this guy. I cannot wait to read the rest of the books in the series, although I've heard that none of them can top this one.
I have to say that this is probably true, considering how well done this book was. I would recommend it to sci-fi readers who aren't in to all the techno aspects of sf; this is more like a fantasy type thing.
Also, if you are a reader interested in the questions of the soul as spirit or physical entity, you might also be interested. Shelves: sf-fantasy , series. Just finished reading this first book and it is so fascinating.
My dad told me the first 3 books are great but the last 2 are not. I think I am going to start reading book 2 now. Finished this book just now. June 21 "Really enjoying it. So curious what is going to happen next and I love that P. Farmer used real people like Richard Francis Burton. I always wante Wow. I always wanted to re-read. Great book! View 2 comments. Apr 14, Gregory rated it it was amazing Shelves: fiction-scifi , read-before , favorites. The first PJF novel I ever read.
His short stories from sci-fi magazines had impressed me but this novel went way beyond that. This novel has one of the most memorable opening sequences in all of sci-fi literature. The mix of sci-fi and religion is always fascinating to me but in the hands of PJF, it was doubly fascinating. Aug 06, azarakhsh rated it really liked it. It was odd, great and unique in the most trippy way! If it weren't for my expectation for different characters to speak in different tones and point of views due to their drastic differences, it would have been a five star read!
Now I leave you to pay a visit to my Dreamgum stash! You get Imagine that every human who ever lived, from the earliest Neanderthals to the present, is resurrected after death on the banks of an astonishing and seemingly endless river on an unknown world.
They are miraculously provided with food, but with not a clue to the possible meaning of this strange afterlife. And so billions of people from history, and before, must start living again. Some set sail on the great river questing for the meaning of their resurrection, and to find and confront their mysterious benefactors.
On this long journey, we meet Sir Richard Francis Burton, Mark Twain, Odysseus, Cyrano de Bergerac, and many others, most of whom embark upon searches of their own in this huge afterlife. The basis of the television miniseries from Syfy. Mark Twain has a dream: to build a riverboat that will rival the most magnificent paddle-wheelers ever navigated on the mighty Mississippi.
Then, to steer it up the endless waterway that dominates his new home planet - and at last discover its hidden source. But before he can carry out his plan, he first must undertake a dangerous voyage to unearth a fallen meteor. All for the purpose of storming the ominous stone tower at the mouth of the river, where the all-powerful overseers of Riverworld - and their secrets - lie in wait.
Science fiction-roman. Miraculously provided with food, but with no clues to the meaning of their strange new afterlife, billions of people from every period of Earth's history - and prehistory - must start again.
Sir Richard Francis Burton would be the first to glimpse the incredible way-station, a link between worlds. This forbidden sight would spur the renowned 19th-century explorer to uncover the truth. Along with a remarkable group of compatriots, including Alice Liddell Hargreaves the Victorian girl who was the inspiration for Alice in Wonderland , an English-speaking Neanderthal, a WWII Holocaust survivor, and a wise extraterrestrial, Burton sets sail on the magnificent river.
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