The Fabulous Riverboat

Author: Philip Jose Farmer

In 1952, a young Philip JosÃƒÃ‚Â© Farmer wrote a novel for a contest, and won. Unfortunately, the prize money was misappropriated, the novel was never published, and Farmer nearly gave up writing as a result. But more than a decade later he began reworking the material from that unpublished novel, first as a novella, which later still became part of To Your Scattered Bodies Go, which in turn became the first volume in a series that would go on to contain four more novels and a collection of stories.To Your Scattered Bodies Go begins with the British explorer, Richard Burton, dying on Earth and waking up on the shore of a mysterious river. There are others there, figures from different periods of Earth's history including a Neanderthal, an alien who wiped out all life on Earth in the 21st century, and Alice Liddell, the original of Alice in Wonderland. Burton sets out to explore the river, and almost immediately finds himself fighting Hermann Goring who has set up his own kingdom on one part of the riverbank. Burton finds out that when he is killed he is reborn at a different point on the river, and he uses this device to continue his journey and eventually come face to face with the Ethicals who created the Riverworld.In subsequent volumes, The Fabulous Riverboat, The Dark Design, The Magic Labyrinth and Gods of Riverworld, an ever-expanding cast of characters, including Samuel Clemens, Eric Bloodaxe, King John, Cyrano de Bergerac, Tom Mix, AphraBehn and Jack London, further explore the river, and come ever closer to solving the mystery of the Riverworld. To Your Scattered Bodies Go won the Hugo Award. Basically this is just one big epic adventure that gives Farmer an excuse to throw in any historical figure he likes at any point in the story. There's no great depth to the story, but it is great fun.

Books in Riverworld Series (4)

The Fabulous Riverboat

The Dark Design

The Magic Labyrinth

The Gods Of Riverworld

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