Phileas Fogg and the War of Shadows in Philip José Farmer's Wold Newton Universe

May 03, 2015 Anthony rated it really liked it

Shelves: crossover-universe, philip-jose-farmer, wold-newton-universe, meteor-house-publishers

I’ll start with a couple of admissions: 1. I’m a big fan of Philip Jose Farmer’s Wold-Newton novels/biographies. 2. I’m a big fan of the work Meteor House has done to continue Phil’s legacy, with the backing of Phil and Bette Farmer (before their deaths) and the Farmer family (since). 3. It’s been many a year since I’ve read The Other Log of Phileas Fogg. Those three facts are pertinent, I think, to reviewing MP’s latest Wold-Newton novella.

There’s a lot of talk lately about sequel novels “sanct I’ll start with a couple of admissions: 1. I’m a big fan of Philip Jose Farmer’s Wold-Newton novels/biographies. 2. I’m a big fan of the work Meteor House has done to continue Phil’s legacy, with the backing of Phil and Bette Farmer (before their deaths) and the Farmer family (since). 3. It’s been many a year since I’ve read The Other Log of Phileas Fogg. Those three facts are pertinent, I think, to reviewing MP’s latest Wold-Newton novella.

There’s a lot of talk lately about sequel novels “sanctioned by [family of original author],” but I can’t think of any recent such situation where the family has been involved the way the Farmer family has been with Meteor House (extending back to Phil hand-picking certain authors to continue certain worlds/stories before he passed on), and I think such involvement lends books like this more than just an air of authenticity. Of course, the family stamp of approval doesn’t guarantee the sequel/continuation will be well-written or even connect with the spirit of the original work (I was notoriously vocal about how little I felt Dacre Stoker’s Dracula continuation followed his grand-uncle Bram’s original, for instance, as compared to how much it owed to versions like Francis Ford Coppola’s film). But Meteor House does a solid job of matching authors with the works they’re going to continue (Christopher Paul Carey on the Opar books; Win Scott Eckert on the Patricia Wildman stories) and Josh Reynolds is a great fit to continue Fogg’s adventures.

It having been years since I last read The Other Log, I can also report that Reynolds does a fine job filling in enough background that I didn’t feel lost or confused as to the main characters and their histories (both individual and shared) while also not so over-burdening the story with background and wink-wink-nod-nod cameos that the novella loses momentum. (This latter is a tendency some New Pulp and “crossover fiction” authors have; I love cameos and small nods to other characters, but I don’t want them to overwhelm the story I’m currently invested in. They need to be pertinent, as they are here.)

Character-wise, this is absolutely the Fogg I remember from Farmer’s novel: self-possessed, aware of his weaknesses, more concerned about family and friends than about the War he has long since left behind. It’s also the Nemo/Moriarty I remember (Farmer posits them as the same person). I don’t recall Sebastian Moran being quite so blood-thirsty, but time and a large number of Holmes pastiches could have erased that from my memory.

Plot-wise, Reynolds doesn’t waste a page of the space he’s been given. He starts with a slam-bang action scene that both serves to set the tone and to remove our hero Fogg from his support systems. While I was initially sad that Passpartout is written out of the story so quickly, I also understood why it was necessary: this installment is about Fogg being drawn, however unwillingly, back into a shadow war on the world stage – subplots involving his sidekick or his family would only work against the urgent nature of the plot. As the first installment of an intended series, War of Shadows sets a bunch of intriguing stuff in motion, but it also feels pretty complete in and of itself. If the remainder of the project were somehow not to see print, I’d still feel satisfied that I read a rollicking good adventure yarn with a strong ending. ...more

Like · see review