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sandygx260's review
4.0
For some odd reason I wanted to re-read the PJF novel Flesh. While searching for that book I found this book in one of my many bookcases and realized I had never read it. Too many books suffer that fate in my house.
What a damned weird book. I understand where PJF went with this book. This was released in 1969 and I am sure sci-fi readers did not want their heroes to be perceived as queer. It was as if PJF put forth readers would rather his heroes be the sons of a notorious, famous killer, violent and brutal, than be queer.
He spun a clever twist.
What a damned weird book. I understand where PJF went with this book. This was released in 1969 and I am sure sci-fi readers did not want their heroes to be perceived as queer. It was as if PJF put forth readers would rather his heroes be the sons of a notorious, famous killer, violent and brutal, than be queer.
He spun a clever twist.
purepazaak's review
5.0
i was hiking with someone as they were reading this book (on my recommendation). They were so invested that they didnt notice me almost falling to my death while shimmying across a narrow ledge
its that good
edgar rice burroughs doesnt understand tarzan, but philip jose farmer does
its that good
edgar rice burroughs doesnt understand tarzan, but philip jose farmer does
shelton's review
3.0
Well, that might be the weirdest book I've ever read. Thought it was a really clever satire at first, but the depravity was so relentless that by about the halfway point it stopped being shocking (well... mostly) and became a bit of a slog.
chramies's review
3.0
In which PJF files off the serial numbers of Tarzan and Doc Savage, makes them fight, and in so doing invents both slashfic (as noted in several earlier reviews of this book) and also quite probably crackfic. Has a regular 'rebellion against the gods' kind of ethos to it which gives it a plot driver - but that's somehow secondary.
bookwomble's review
3.0
I'm ambivalent about this book. I like it for its use of Tarzan and Doc Savage as templates for its two protagonists and for its "pulpy" theme of evil masterminds plotting global domination. I don't like its use of very graphic sex, violence and, particularly, sexual violence.
Apparently, Farmer wrote the book (and its sequels) as a satire of the pulp novels he evidently enjoyed as a youth, but extended the use of violence and what he appears to have perceived as a latent homo-eroticism, to the nth degree. This is a very explicit and graphic book and not for the easily shocked. If you like sex and violence, this is the book for you!
Personally, I enjoy Farmer's writing and inventiveness but could have done without the excessive shedding of bodily fluids of various descriptions.
Apparently, Farmer wrote the book (and its sequels) as a satire of the pulp novels he evidently enjoyed as a youth, but extended the use of violence and what he appears to have perceived as a latent homo-eroticism, to the nth degree. This is a very explicit and graphic book and not for the easily shocked. If you like sex and violence, this is the book for you!
Personally, I enjoy Farmer's writing and inventiveness but could have done without the excessive shedding of bodily fluids of various descriptions.
traveller1's review
2.0
Having re-read this novel I do not have as good an opinion of it as do many of my fellow gr reviewers. The story is one long battle, a detailed description of how the protagonist, Tarzan (more or less), defeats, with his superhuman strength and endurance, his many enemies. The background is a group of near immortals known as the "Nine", who manipulate Tarzan, his opponents, and the world for their nefarious ends.
What is supposed to make this a killer of a story is the sex. Here our hero can only get erect when he is killing someone (or thinking about killing someone), he also eats testicles and the occasional clitoris. Umm, I cannot find any real need for this in the story, apart from a clumsy desire to shock, redolent of the times in which the novel was written.
I found myself flicking through the second half of the novel. It was no more than pages of predictable battle. Boring.
Pass.
What is supposed to make this a killer of a story is the sex. Here our hero can only get erect when he is killing someone (or thinking about killing someone), he also eats testicles and the occasional clitoris. Umm, I cannot find any real need for this in the story, apart from a clumsy desire to shock, redolent of the times in which the novel was written.
I found myself flicking through the second half of the novel. It was no more than pages of predictable battle. Boring.
Pass.
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