Here is high fidelity fiction at Philip Jos Farmer's storytelling best. It's a vibrant, distractingly different tale of three centuries into the future. And as you read you'll have a vague, uneasy feeling that it's all taking place somewhere in the unexplored parts of the universe, even today.

Enslaved by a triangular powered despotism -- one lone man sets his sights to the Six Bright Stars and eventual freedom of his world.

Thirty billion people from throughout Earth's history have been resurrected along the great and winding waterways of Riverworld. Most began life anew--accepting without question the sustenance provided by their mysterious benefactors. But a rebellious handful, including Mark Twain, Richard Burton, and Peter Jairus Frigate, burned to confront the unseen masters who controlled their fate--and these few launched an invasion that will ultimately yield the mind-boggling truth. The story was chronicled in four previous volumes, and is now concluded in "Gods of Riverworld."
Riverworld's omnipotent leaders must finally be confronted, and the renegades of Riverworld--led by the intrepid Sir Richard Francis Burton--will control the fantastic mechanism that rules them. But the most awesome challenge lies ahead. For in the vast corridors and secret rooms of the tower stronghold, an unknown enemy watches and waits to usurp the usurpers....

Reissued to follow the Syfy Channel film of "Riverworld," this fourth book in the classic Riverworld series continues the adventures of Samuel Clemens and Sir Richard Francis Burton as they travel through Farmer's strange and wonderful Riverworld, a place where everyone who ever lived is simultaneously resurrected along a single river valley that stretches over an entire planet. Famous characters from history abound.
Now Burton and Clemens, who have traveled for more than thirty years on two great ships, are about to reach the end of the River. But there is a religion, The Church of the Second Chance, that has grown up along the River and its adherents, possibly inspired by aliens, are determined to destroy the riverboats. A coming battle may destroy Burton and Clemens, but even if they survive, how can they penetrate the alien tower of the Ethicals, who created this astonishing world? What can humans do against a race capable of creating a world and resurrecting the entire human race on it?