Pajiba

So who's a cylon?

I'm a sucker - I'll watch for Helo.

That looks potentially creepy and twisty. I'm in.

but wait, what happens if you die after you've... died. Do you just keep getting resurrected in the river? I had to watch this w/ the sound off, so perhaps I missed something.

Also, it's an interesting premise. Would someone from the 12th Century outlive someone who died in the 21st Century? What survival skills would prove to be most useful in a post-death world?

The first atempt was ridiculously bad. Tom Berenger? Come on.

But this looks interesting.

Sorry, that should be "you are reborn in the body you would have had when you were 20 years old if you had kept yourself in perfect health and peak physical condition"

The main characters in the novel, if I remember, were Sam Clemens and Sir Richard Burton, plus a host of other characters from history, real and imagined.

Bessie - Some people from the "future" are there (the books were written in the mid-80s so I think Farmer assumes the world ends around the year 2000) but not nearly as many as you might expect. Which is part of the mystery.

Actually, since there are more people alive now than have ever lived in the Earth's history, so modern women would vastly outnumber medieval men. I think the medievals (and Victorians) would be somewhat intimidated.

You'd probably have more difficulty living alongside "modern" Indians and Chinese with their distinctive views of women and their place in the world.

Neodiogenes, heck I'm having that problem now. One of the joys of working for a university is that you get exposed to many different fascinating cultures. One of the downsides--you get exposed to many of the chauvinistic attitudes most (or at least some) of the men of this country have left behind. Sometimes it's enraging; sometimes it's well-intentioned but still aggravating.

My first boss was Indian and a sweet guy, but he could NOT wrap his head around the fact that I, an unmarried woman, bought my own house. It's like his brain couldn't cope with the information so it immediately gets erased, and every time I run into him now we have the same conversation.

"So! Where are you living now?"

"I bought a house in the country."

"Oh, that's great! You got married!"

"Um...no, just bought the house myself."

*blank stare as brain performs erasure of contradictory data*

That's why I think it would be so much fun running into these chaps from the past. Did the swords come with them or did they forge them after being resurrected? Do you bring through whatever you were carrying on your person when you died? I gotta read these books.

The first four books of this series are pretty great. I highly recommend them to the sci-fi folks.

Did the swords come with them or did they forge them after being resurrected? Do you bring through whatever you were carrying on your person when you died?

No swords -- in fact, the world had no significant deposits of metal. Every individual awoke (all at the same time) completely naked except for a "grail" -- a hollow metal cylinder that the resurectees could put in these mushroom-shaped artificial devices spaced at regular intervals along the river. The devices would fill the grails with food and other necessities every morning and evening (including, if I remember, tobacco and some kind of psychoactive chewing gum).

The weather was also perfect everywhere on the world, so there was no need for shelter, and there were plenty of grails and charging stations to go around.

The theory was that if humanity lacked for nothing, and could only make rudimentary tools, there would be no desire for conflict or domination over one's fellow man (or woman). Needless to say, the novels would be very short if things indeed worked out that way.

Wicked premise, and I like the casting too. But fuck you very much for adding to my already overflowing pile of reading to do!

I just like how all the Medieval fuckers were running things. Fuck you bitches and your "logic." So what if you know what a cavity is. Or the internet. What good is the internet when I know how to fire a longbow? Or wield a sword for that matter?

Admin said "Well, it's definately got my interest piqued. I'll have to pick up the books as I'm always looking for new authors in the genre."

It's not new. Philip Jose Farmer is hardly a "new" author either. I first read Riverworld in the late 70s. It was good. Very original though I recall the teenage-me loved the idea of a great drug with little after effects that was great to make women want to have sex with you...benzedrine!
Sequels less good. Denouement of series poor.
Doesn't age particularly well, but bootstrappig a Tech society through various stages was good.