To Your Scattered Bodies Go (Riverworld Saga, Book 1)

by Philip José Farmer

Book Overview

Richard Francis Burton attempts to fight his way out of the Riverworld in which he finds himself trapped after death. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0345419677
• ISBN13: 9780345419675
• Release Date: June 1998
• Publisher: Del Rey
• Length: 224 Pages
• Weight: 0.45 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.0" x 0.6" x 5.1"

Customer Reviews

I saw the tv movie "Riverworld" and when I found out it was based on a book then of course I had to

I love the whole concept of every human being who died on earth being resurrected on an alien world in young healthy bodies where they would be twenty-five forever. I really like the Burton character, Alice is a bit of a prude and Frigate a bit of a cry baby but I love the alien and the neanderthal. Overall an excellent adventure story!

Very Well Done!

This is the 1st Riverworld book and probably the best at least in terms of originality. The Idea is that everyone who ever lived is resurrected on a planet with a huge river.Pretty simple, the main character is Sir Richard Francis Burton (a real life explorer who spent much of his life searching for the nile) and he forms and leads a party that includes a Neanderthal, an alien, and Alice from Alice in Wonderland. The rest of the book is spent with them journeying towards the headwaters of the river to try and find out the mystery of how their situation (i.e. being resurrected on the vast river planet) came to be.As already said this is most likely the best book in the series. The idea is fresh and the character of Burton who was a real person is a good one to have lead an adventure. The story is also fleshed out well with the assistance of the interesting supporting cast. I especially liked the inclusion of Alice.The major enemy in this book is Hermann Goring another person of historical fame, who provides the readers with an exceptionally good and real antagonist for Burton, who is a very well done hero.Despite the questionability of the later books(I've written reviews on them as well) this one is exceptionally well done.

Certainly close to a classic

Something you have a book that has such an amazing concept that the entire book can be carried on just that one concept, regardless of how stirring the plot is or how deep the characters are or how exciting the prose is. With the concept that Farmer introduces in this novel he sure comes darn close but he really needed just a little extra to boost this novel into "true classic" status. What's the concept? Basically every human that has ever lived wakes up alongside a seemingly endless river on some strange planet for no apparent reason to basically do what people do. Food and even clothing is provided for, but really it's just a big question mark. Enter famous explorer Richard Burton who very quickly decides that he must penetrate the center of this mystery and try to find exactly what this is all about. Along the way he meets bunches of people from different times, some famous some not, gets involved in a series of adventures and sort of figures it out. But not quite. Burton is probably the best character in the book in the sense that he's supposed to the hero and yet there's quite a few reasons not to like him (he's a bit racist and a tad sexist, among other things . . .) which is good because being a historical character it shows Farmer was at least doing some research. The other characters don't make out so well and being that most of them seem to drop out halfway through the book, you really don't miss them since the focus really is squarely on Burton (the alien in particular seems to have just been included because he could make important revelations and thus it would make sense because he's an advanced alien and thus knows everything . . . not explained why he was resurrected though . . . also Peter Frigate mostly cries unless he needs to fight and then he kills with reckless abandon, er, mood swing anyone?) and as long as it stays there you can overlook things like that. Farmer has great fun with the concept and frustratingly gives us just a taste of the Riverworld, bypassing entire communities in a sentence that he could have spent a whole chapter on. The plot moves swiftly, with the usual absurd coincidences that only occur to you after you stop reading because he keeps the story moving so fast there's no time to think, which is good. Sometimes it's a mite too swiftly, subplots start but don't go anywhere (there's hints of romance that never turns into anything) and imminent revelations either are ignored or turn out to be nothing special. But the book is way too short and the ending is basically just a "To Be Continued" that reveals a bunch of stuff that may or may not be true. In the end it feels like the world's longest prologue and while enormously entertaining as such, doesn't leave you with a whole lot to take away from the book. Still the concept is one of the greatest in SF and just watching Farmer pull it off and lay down the foundation for the rest of the series is great fun. But his inability to really turn th

Okay I'm hooked

I picked this one up at a used bookstore and was pleasantly suprised. It is one of those books where the concept alone is fascinating, that every person who ever lived is reborn somewhere along a seemingly endless river(approx. 36-37 billion in all). They can't reproduce, and they need not work for their food, and neither can they die and stay dead so seemingly they have nothing to do but enjoy peace and pleasure for all eternity....well we are talking about human beings so it doesn't work out that way! It is the questions about this world that pulls the reader along. Who could have built it? What is its purpose? And will it all end as suddenly as it began? And through it all there is The River, it is the central feature of RiverWorld, presumably millions of miles long, one could travel upon it for millenia and never get to the end. For that matter does The River even have a beginning and an end? This novel is very spiritual, what would you do if you had eternal life? Sit back and enjoy it or fight against the current(literally) to find out the meaning of it all? Warning if you read the first book in the series you're going to be compelled to pick the rest up to.

Must reading for SF fans

This volume kicks off the five-book series, and it's a fascinating concept brought vividly to life. Though I'd agree that Farmer might slacken a bit in later volumes, that hasn't prevented me from reading this series twice over the last 25 years...

Mastefully done with the utmost care

What captures your attention and holds it is not just the brilliantly creative story premise, which by itself would be worth a read, but the quality of research which Philip Jose Farmer clearly put into creating this novel. By using Burton as his main character, a flesh-and-blood anti-hero plucked straight from history, the fantastic action takes on a very believable feel, being no more amazing than anything else Burton accomplished in life. JPF has done an incredible job of researching Burton and painting him in a completely understandable and human way. I'd almost consider this book a hybrid of science fiction and historical fantasy - the historical characters are generally, more fleshed out and better developed than any of the fictional characters. I highly recommend this book, but suggest avoiding the rest of the series - they are just a series of cliff-hangers clearly designed to milk the River World story for everything it's worth. This first story makes a wonderfully self-contained adventure, and the rest of the books add nothing (and subtract much through revisionist plot-adjustment) that I sincerely wish I'd avoided them myself.