Now this, is some creative shit.

The concept of To Your Scattered Bodies Go is that everyone whoever died on Earth is reborn along the shores of Riverworld. Literally this means billions of people awake from their deaths, reborn in youthful bodies, and are confronted with the entirety of human civilizations, from ancient Sumerians to tribal Native Americans to futuristic twenty-first century mankind, as their neighbors. Our point of view character is Sir Richard Francis Burton, who is obsessed with discovering the meaning behind the resurrection. Along the way we meet a colorful cast of character, including a Neanderthal, and actual extraterrestrial, a stand-in character for the author, and Hermann Göring, to just mention a few.

The potential here is huge, Farmer has the entirety of human history at his disposal to explore topics of human nature, morality and death. For example, our protagonist is faced with his past antisemitism (The Jew, the Gypsy and El Islam, which is an actual book from Sir Richard Francis Burton) when a holocaust survivor joins his group. Mankind is not only confronted with their past, but also their future mistakes (such as when Earth is visited by extraterrestrials). Farmer is also not afraid to show the more violent aspect of human nature, as slavery and warfare become commonplace almost immediately in Riverworld, whilst also providing the opportunity for overcoming their past mistakes.

For me I was just blow away by the pure potential of the universe Philip Jose Farmer created in To Your Scattered Bodies Go, and I look forward to continuing the series to see if that potential pays off. I hope it does not get bogged down in explaining the reasons why or how Riverworld was created, and instead focuses on the society created out of the amalgamation of all mankind.