As I wrote before several more items were on its way to me. Two of the items are older fanzines, one from 1957 and the other from 1964. They were received this week.

Two also ordered books were sent back. One back to France by me, because I got the wrong printing as was advertised by the book dealer. The other was sent back to Germany by the post office, because my address was not complete on the envelop. That seller will send it to me again, with the full address this time he promised.
I still have to receive more books, but the shipments take longer than usually because of the Covid-19 problems.

Brian McCabe

Richard Bergeron

The fanzine Skyhook #24, Summer 1957, contains a long letter by Philip José Farmer. In it Phil praises the previous issue and its contents, and made a remark on an error made in Farmer's in that issue published poem "Black Squirrel on Cottonwood Limb's Trip".
You can read this letter online at The Official Philip José Farmer Web Page.

In the fanzine Zenith Speculation #7, December 1964, Charles Platt wrote a critical essay, "The Strange Relations of Philip José Farmer", in which he explores the biological ideas Farmer used in some novels and stories. The cover by Brian McCabe illustrates Farmer's novel Flesh.
By the way, the editor of Zenith Speculation, Peter R. Weston, changed the fanzine's title in 1966 to only Speculation.

Some time ago, in February this year, I wrote I could stop collecting as I had received the last missing first printing in my collection, that of The Green Odyssey (1957). Yes, it was the last first printing I was looking for, but not the last item of his work.
The past couple of weeks I received these books and a fanzine, and more are still on its way to me. Most of the newly received ones were already included in the bibliography, but two are 'new' on these pages.
The items are as follows.
A Czech book from Slovakia:

• Bájná loď, 1993 (The Fabulous Riverboat)

From France:

• Le noir dessein, 1995 (The Dark Design) [= new!]

From Germany:

• Das dunkle Muster, 1996 (The Dark Design) [= new!]

From Israel:

• התבנית האפלה (The Magic Labyrinth), 2004

From Italy:

• Alle sorgenti del fiume, 1989 (The Fabulous Riverboat)
• Il fiume della vita, 1976 (To Your Scattered Bodies Go)
• Il grande disegno, 1995 (The Dark Design)

From Lithuania:

• Visatų kūrėjas, 1994 (The Maker of Universes)
• Užslinks naktis, 1991 (original anthology,
  with "The Sliced-Crosswise Only-on-Tuesday World")

An UK fanzine from the US:

• Speculation #26, May 1970 (with a letter by PJF)

Charles Platt published in the period 1981-1985 seven issues of his fanzine The Patchin Review (The inside guide to science fiction).
«Because I lived in New York City, and knew all the editors, and also knew most of the writers in the United States and Britain, I felt I was in a position to publish a small magazine of commentary that would be frank about the changes that were occurring and could agitate against some of them. That was my intention in The Patchin Review. I also decided to have some fun by publishing a self-satirical gossip column.», writes Charles Platt in his new introduction for The Complete Patchin Review (2019).


«Right from the start, it caused endless trouble for me.» he writes in the same introduction.

In The Patschin Review Issue #7, the Final Issue, of March 1985 Philip José Farmer wrote a letter, about some of his 'guilty pleasures', his favorite writers, and about the outline he wrote for a novel titled Wild and Weird Clime.

In Issue #5 came the announcement «Also coming up, I hope, will be an article by Philip José Farmer in defense of fantasy», but this one wasn't published, alas.

Ansible Editions published in 2019 all seven issues in The Complete Patschin Review as a free ebook.

Thanks Willem Hettinga for sending me this information!

Meteor House, a publisher's name which you can see regularly on these pages, recently released the ebook of Dayworld: A Hole in Wednesday. This novel is written by Philip José Farmer and co-authored by his grand nephew Danny Adams.
Originally published in a limited hardcover edition, and in a trade paperback, the novel is now available for $ 2.99 via Amazon or BN. If you haven't the printed version yet, then I recommend you to buy the ebook. It is a great novel!


Publisher Heyne in Germany released in December 2016 the ebook of the omnibus Fleisch. The omnibus had seen eight printings from Heyne since its first publication in 1989. It contains three novels: Die Verkörperung des Bösen (The Image of the Beast), Außer Atem (Blown) and Fleisch (Flesh).
The price for the ebook is € 9,99 or $ 11.99 in the US.

Meteor House announced another book for release this year, A Rough Knight for the Queen, a non-fiction work:

Trade paperback

«Philip José Farmer fans know that he was fascinated with 19th century explorer and author Sir Richard Francis Burton. Farmer made Burton the protagonist of the Hugo winning novel, To Your Scattered Bodies Go, the first book in the Riverworld series. In Gods of Riverworld, the final book in the series, Peter Jairus Frigate (Farmer’s fictional stand in) said that he had written a biography of Richard Burton... Now Meteor House brings you Farmer’s 26,000 word biography of Burton in both an affordable trade paperback and in a signed limited hardcover. Both editions feature introductory material by Mick Walton (author of Sir Richard Burton and His Circle), Mark Hodder (author of the Burton and Swinburne novels) and Paul Spiteri (editor of Pearls from Peoria). The hardcover limited edition will be signed by Walton, Hodder, Spiteri, and cover artist Charles Berlin.». The price of the trade paperback is $15, and of the signed limited edition hardcover $40. The print run of the hardcover limited edition will be determined by the number of preorders. This means the majority of hardcovers will be sold before the book is even printed, so preorder your copy today!

Signed limited hardcover

The books will be released in August 2020.

The biography "A Rough Knight for the Queen" was only once published before, in the collection Pearls from Peoria (2006).

In the Iran year 1397 released publisher Drop a Persian translation of The Adventure of the Peerless Peer, with the title:
شرلوک هولمز و نجیب زاده ی بی همتا.
This title translates like: Sherlock Holmes and the Unmatched Gentleman. The transliteration of the Persian title isn't easy to speak out loud: Shrlwk Hwlmz w njyb zadh y by hmta.
According to our calendar the book was published in December 2018. The price of 140,000 real looks extreme, but it is only about $3.50. The novella was published as written by John H. Watson.
See this Iran bookpage.

With this first Persian translation Farmer's books now have been translated in 32 countries, witch brings the total number of countries that released Farmer's work —including the US, UK, Canada and Australia— to 36.

As you might know by now I try to collect all editions worldwide of Philip José Farmer's work. Including all the reprints of his books. The collection now includes about 1350 editions and printings of Farmer's books. I'm still looking for about 200 known editions and reprints.
Next to his books I also collect all anthologies, magazines and fanzines, and his non-fiction work as well as the non-fiction written about him.
The collection grows and grows every year. But till now I hadn't found any of the Bulgarian editions for sale. There were seven books I was looking for, but recently I found four of them online at a Bulgarian book shop. Thanks for the service Zhivka Zhelyazkova!
The four books are:

• В телата си разпръснати върнете се (To Your Scattered Bodies Go)
• Приказният кораб (The Fabulous Riverboat)
• Частен космос / Зад стените на Тера (A Private Cosmos / Behind the Walls of Terra)
• Невъзможен свят (The Lavalite World)

There are still three more novels, in The World of Tiers series, that I am looking for. See the index of Bulgarian books.
Only the first two books in the Riverworld series were translated.

For a very long period of time I still was missing a first hardcover edition of The Green Odyssey. It was published by Ballantine Books in 1957, many years before I started reading science fiction, and even more years before I started collecting all the novels and stories written by Philip José Farmer.
I started collecting the US publications in 1973 with snail mail orders to Richard Witter (F&SF Book Co.) in New York. One of my first orders were copies of the original hardcover editions of To Your Scattered Bodies Go and The Fabulous Riverboat (1971).
I received the second one, but Scattered Bodies was just out of print, alas. I bought it several years ago for more than hundred times the original price.
A copy of the original edition of The Green Odyssey was nowhere to be found, at least not for reasonable prices. It wasn't always easy to get the catalogs from second hand book sellers. Mind you, this was the pre-internet time.
Once there was internet one could check the online dealers, and I saw the book at Abebooks for about a thousand times the original price, from 2000 till 2500 dollars and more.
The last time I checked Abebooks the prices ranged from $2.250 till the huge amount of $9.500 for a clean copy. Most of the small print-run of the hardcover went to (military) libraries. Clean copies are very scarce also, and very expensive. This particular book is one of the scarcest titles in the Ballantine hardcover series.

But recently I found online a copy for sale for a very reasonable price. Not a clean copy, but an ex-library one in a reasonable good condition. See the picture above.
Finally my collection of Farmers first editions is complete, I now can stop collecting...

Last November I ordered and received seven books from a Japanese web shop. That went very smoothly. So I looked again but did not see yet any of the other missing books in my collection.
But I discovered that the web shop also has a huge collection of Japanese magazines for sale. It took me a while to check them all, and I found eleven science fiction magazines that I wanted. Most of them are issues of the S-F Magazine (S-F マガジン).
The issues, and the stories in it are:

• S-F マガジン #53 ("Sail On! Sail On!")
• S-F マガジン #210 ("Only Who Can Make a Tree")
• S-F マガジン #213 ("Don't Wash the Carats")
• S-F マガジン #214 ("The Sumerian Oath")
• S-F マガジン #215 ("The Voice of the Sonar in My Vermiform
  Appendix")
• S-F マガジン #216 ("Brass and Gold")
• S-F マガジン #218 ("The Sliced-Crosswise Only-on-Tuesday
  World")
• S-F マガジン #317 ("The Alley Man")
• S-F マガジン #370 ("The Making of Revelation, Part I")
• SF宝石 #1 ("After King Kong Fell")
• 奇想天外 #3 (The Adventure of the Peerless Peer)

I added and corrected some data with these publications.

In December 2019 and this month, January 2020, I received three foreign publications with stories by Philip José Farmer. They were mentioned earlier on this page, but I did not have the publications myself yet. I try to buy every publication worldwide for my already very huge Farmer collection.
Often I get very nice responses from the sellers when I explain the reason why I want to buy the book or magazine, in a language I do not understand. Always referring to this website. From a Czech book shop I got: «Your website is fine and interesting.»
The new publications are:

• Japan: Dangerous Visions 1 (危険なヴィジョン 1)
• Romania: Dangerous Visions (Viziuni periculoase)
• Czech Republic: The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction

The first two books, from Japan and Romania, contain "Riders of the Purple Wage". The Czech version of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction contains the novelette "A Scarletin Study", published under the pseudonym Jonathan Swift Somers III.
I had to correct some of the information that already was included.

Last week I discovered a Japanese web shop that had several Phil Farmer books for sale. I ordered seven of them and received the books within a week. Till now I had only been able sparsely buying single books from Japan, if at all.
The seven books shown above are:

• The Maker of Universes (階層宇宙の創造者)
• The Gates of Creation (異世界の門)
• A Private Cosmos (階層宇宙の危機)
• Behind the Walls of Terra (地球の壁の裏に)
• The Green Odyssey (緑の星のオデッセイ)
• The Fabulous Riverboat (わが夢のリバーボート)
• The Unreasoning Mask (気まぐれな仮面)

When I received the paperbacks I discovered that five of them are not first printings, although they look the same. That are the first five of the above list. These are later, undated reprints. The copyright pages are the same as with the first printings, they only mention the publication date of the first printing.
The only difference between the printings is the new price, printed on the spine and the back cover.

Online I saw this picture on the website '70s Sci-Fi Art'. It is the cover art by Richard Powers for Philip José Farmer's collection The Alley God, a paperback published in 1962 by Ballantine Books.
It is typical cover art for that period of time, and I liked it —and still like it— very much. It is not illustrating any of the three included stories, "The Alley Man" , "The Captain's Daughter" and "The God Business", as far as I remember. But still a dark and strong picture.

"The most significant Latin American literary voice of his generation" wrote The New York Times on 20 December 2012. Roberto Bolaño was praised for the eleven novels he wrote. He was only 50 years old when he died on July 15, 2003.

The Spirit of Science Fiction (El espíritu de la ciencia-ficción in Spanish) was completed by Bolaño in approximately 1984. It was published posthumously in Spanish in 2016 and in English in 2019. The novel is seen by many as an ur-text to The Savage Detectives, another of his novels, "populated with precursory character sketches and situations" and centering on the activities of young poets and writers living in Mexico City.

In the novel Bolaño published several letters of admiration to American science fiction writers, one of them to Philip José Farmer. He shared the same ideas about the use of sex in science fiction. Bolaño proposes several ideas about this in his letter: «In each story, there should be at least one sexual act.»

Alas Farmer never saw this letter, although he would have liked it very much in my opinion.
But Fred Fischer (US) bought and read the book and did see the letter. It prompted him to write an interesting essay about this, with the complete text of the letter to Farmer for which Fred and I got permission from Penguin Press. You can read the essay here on the site.

(The shown covers are of the first Spanish edition, 2016, and of the English translation, published in the UK by Picador, 2019.)

Locus, the Magazine of the Science Fiction Field, had on August 27, 2019 a news item about the renaming of the Campbell Award.
Jeannette Ng, winner of this year's Campbell Award, started a discussion about its name:
«John W. Campbell, for whom this award was named, was a fascist. Through his editorial control of Astounding Science Fiction, he is responsible for setting a tone of science fiction that still haunts the genre to this day. Sterile. Male. White. Exalting in the ambitions of imperialists and colonisers, settlers and industrialists. Yes, I am aware there are exceptions.»
The award's name changed to "The Astounding Award for Best New Writer".

In 1954 Farmer already was very critical about Campbell. He calls to Mr. Campbell to dare to publish more interesting and literary stories as he was publishing at the time in Astounding. And to open up Astounding to new types of ideas and for allowing his writers to use more mainstream techniques.
Farmer wrote this in his essay "Parables are Pablum: A Reply to Mr. Farmer, a Letter to Mr. Campbell" in the fanzine Skyhook #23.

«Farmer is applauding from the grave», writes Fred Fischer (US) in his e-mail to me. I fully agree!

Only a month away and FarmerCon XIV will take place. And as in the previous years again in conjunction with PulpFest. The convention will be held in the weekend of August 15-18, 2019 in Pittsburgh.
I won't be able to attend.

Of the program in this weekend (see here or here) is only one item for the FarmerCon attendees: FarmerCon XIV: Farmer of the Pulps: A Harvest of Influences (panel, moderated by Paul Spiteri).
See more information about this item on the PulpFest 2019 site.

If you want to join FarmerCon XIV you have to send an email to Mike Croteau, and also register with PulpFest.
Everyone who attends, have a great time!

Two months ago came the announcement from Meteor House of the new collection Greatheart Silver and Other Pulp Heroes. This time they announced the cover.
The nice cover design is done by Keith Howell.

Table of Contents:
- Introduction, by Garyn G. Roberts, Ph.D.
- "Greatheart Silver"
- "The Return of Greatheart Silver"
- "Greatheart Silver in the First Command"
- "The Grant Robeson Papers" (foreword)
- "Savage Shadow"
- "Skinburn"

There are other pulp hero stories, like "Doc Savage and the Cult of the Blue God" and "Extracts from the Memoirs of "Lord Greystoke"", that aren't included in this collection.

Greatheart Silver and Other Pulp Heroes will be released in hardcover at FarmerCon XIV, August 15-18, in Pittsburgh. The price is $33, but if you preorder it with Meteor House you will get a $5 discount.

Online I discovered the following publications, and ordered them. Three covers for four books? Of the first I found two printings, both from 1975, with the same splashing cover.

1975	2007	2018

La jungle nue (A Feast Unknown)
The first publication of this edition was in April 1974. But, as it turned out after nearly forty-five years, was reprinted twice:
- Champ Libre, January 1975, 2nd printing,
- Champ Libre, October 1975, 3rd printing.

Les amants étrangers (The Lovers)
The first printing of this book was published in January 2007, and it was reprinted with the same cover:
- Gallimard, July 2007, 2nd printing.

Le bateau fabuleux (The Fabulous Riverboat)
The publisher keeps this novel in print:
- Le Livre de Poche, November 2018, 10th printing.

I was very much surprised some days ago to receive an envelop with a photo of Philip José Farmer and his wife, Bette Farmer. The photo is signed by both on the back. There is no information about the photographer, or the reason why, where, or when this picture was made. It is not dated, but my guess is —based on comparing it with other photos of the two— that it is from about 1993.

The sender of the photo, Fred Fischer (US), neither has any information about the picture. He received it a while back from someone who sold him a Farmer book online.
Many thanks for this nice photo Fred!

From Fred Fischer (US) I received an e-mail with a link to a web page on 'Euro Sports Network', with a blog entry of May 1, 2019 called: "Voices Against Time, Ebay Nationalism Part 3". The blog was written by GithYankee.

Fred writes: «My notion is that the author of the chart is trying to use it as an example of proof that the new movement towards diversity in science fiction authorship is doomed.  I guess this argument is part of the brouhaha that the Hugo Awards or perhaps their nominations and the nomination process were embroiled in a few years ago. Maybe it continues?»

The chart shows the Pringle Science Fiction 100 list of bestselling authors. Given are the names, ethnicity, orientation, gender, top 10 sales, and finally 'Last 90 days units'.
I'm not interested in the diversity issue of this blog. That's why I only took part of the chart with the first 16 names. The 16th is that of Farmer.

Author	Top 10 Sales	Last 90 days units
Herbert, Frank	$11,796.00	981
Orwell, George	$7,941.00	1368
Bradbury, Ray	$7,410.00	1374
Wolfe, Gene	$7,122.00	199
Moorcock, Michael	$5,612.00	421
Asimov, Isaac	$5,068.00	1304
Dick, Philip K.	$4,796.00	980
Heinlein, Robert	$4,645.00	681
Vonnegut, Kurt	$3,917.00	1039
Clarke, Arthur	$3,261.00	545
Burgess, Anthony	$3,037.00	203
Burroughs, William S.	$2,692.00	288
Le Guin, Ursula	$2,389.00	407
Leiber, Fritz	$1,994.00	191
Gibson, William	$1,931.00	229
Farmer, Philip Jose	$1,540.00	183

The only reason to show this chart is to give you an idea how PJF is doing in comparison with the other authors of the Pringle Science Fiction 100 list.
If you are interested in the blog or the complete chart follow this link.

Jo Walton's earlier posts for Tor.com about the Hugo finalists have been gathered in the book An Informal History of the Hugos (A Personal Look Back at the Hugo Awards, 1953-2000).

As Farmer had won three Hugo Awards and three Nominations during his career I was curious what Jo Walton, or any of the other contributors, had to say about him. It is less than I expected, and hoped for.

1953 - Winner: Best New Author or Artist
A very short piece, about that Farmer wouldn't have been eligible by today's Campbell rules. He had  been publishing for longer than two years. (That was only one non-sf story in 1946.)

1960 - Nominee: "The Alley Man"
A comment by Rich Horton that this story was quite good.

1961 - Nominee: "Open to Me, My Sister"
Rich Horton: «The Farmer has a good reputation, but I've never read it, and I don't usually like Farmer as much as others do.»

1966 - Nominee: "Day of the Great Shout"
Jo Walton about all the nominees in the 'Best Short Fiction': «Great selection, good choice.»

1968 - Winner: "Riders of the Purple Wage"
Jo Walton: «You couldn't ask for two more different winners, but they are both wonderful in their own ways.»
Gardner Dozois: «...I never liked either the much-overhyped Riders of the Purple Wage or Weyr Search.» (the other winner).
Rich Horton: «I enjoyed the two novella winners in their way, Weyr Search probably more back then, and I don't think they are bad stories, but neither would get my vote.»

1972 - Winner: To Your Scattered Bodies Go
Jo Walton describes in short the story line, and writes: «It's a great book, and if the sequels are less great, it's only because no explanation can possibly live up to that premise. I loved this book with wild enthusiasm when I was a teenager, and it will always have a place in my heart. I think it's a fine Hugo winner.»

With most of the nearly 50 years there is review of the winner's novel, but that is not the case with To Your Scattered Bodies Go. A bit disappointing.
Nevertheless, it's a great reference work if you're curious about the Hugo Awards history, and you might read in it about an interesting work you've not yet read. Publisher is Tor, ISBN 978-0-7653-7908-5 and the price $31.99.

The small publisher Meteor House, owned by Michael Croteau, brings since 2010 every year new collections of stories, new books, or new editions of previous published works. Nearly all of these works are by or in relation to Philip José Farmer.
And as always these books are released at the FarmerCon of that year. That will be no different this year, with the new collection Greatheart Silver and Other Pulp Heroes.
The cover at left is that of the first Greatheart Silver collection in 1982. The new cover is not yet shown.

From Meteor House:
Philip José Farmer had a life-long love affair with the pulps he read in his youth. They influenced nearly everything he wrote, but in the 1970s he paid special tribute to them with several stories. Greatheart Silver and Other Pulp Heroes collects these stories for the first time in hardcover! This collection also features an introduction by college professor and pulp historian, Garyn G. Roberts, Ph.D., and artwork by Keith Howell!

Table of Contents:
- Introduction
- Greatheart Silver
- The Return of Greatheart Silver
- Greatheart Silver in the First Command
- The Grant Robeson Papers
- Savage Shadow
- Skinburn

Greatheart Silver and Other Pulp Heroes will debut at FarmerCon XIV this coming August. The hardcover price is $33, but if you preorder it now you will get a $5 discount.