Greatheart Silver

by Philip José Farmer

Greatheart Silver is fired after his zeppelin is robbed and destroyed by the infamous Blimp Gang and begins a fight against the world's evils as an investigator for Acme Security-Southwest

Genres: Science Fiction, Pulp, Fiction, Fantasy

288 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published May 15, 1982

About the author

Philip José Farmer was an American author, principally known for his science fiction and fantasy novels and short stories. He was born in Terre Haute, Indiana, but spent much of his life in Peoria, Illinois.

Farmer is best known for his Riverworld series and the earlier World of Tiers series. He is noted for his use of sexual and religious themes in his work, his fascination for and reworking of the lore of legendary pulp heroes, and occasional tongue-in-cheek pseudonymous works written as if by fictional characters.

Reviews

[Craig · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a fix-up novel that collects the three novellas that Farmer wrote for Byron Preiss's Weird Heroes original anthology series, 1975 - '77. I think the stories somehow worked better individually in their original separate shorter format. Farmer at times seems to not be able to decide if he wants to celebrate the pulps or lampoon them, and he tends to be so focused on working in little bits of trivia to include every literary/pop culture fiction character ever (some of them extremely obscure) that he neglects to tell a good story while doing it. It's a lot of fun at times, but I appreciated the spirit and intent more than the result this time around.

[Alan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Years ago there was an anthology series called Weird Heroes (bear with the background for a moment). Editor Byron Preiss's hope was to create new pulp heroes for an age where the paperback racks were dominated, as critic and author Brad Mengel has called them, serial vigilantes. Preiss’ mandate to writers culled from science fiction, fantasy and comic books were heroes whose only solution was not violence.

Enter Phillip Jose Farmer award winning writer and creator of the Wold Newton universe. A natural to contribute and his contribution was Greatheart Silver. This book collects those three Weird Heroes stories which move from the absurd to more serious adventure fare.

Excluding his biographies of Tarzan and Doc Savage I have not cared for Farmer's attempts at writing pulp characters. The first Silver story is a cross between humor and homage as Silver ends up a bystander and later a participant at the last great battle of the pulp heroes and villains from the 1930s (who are all about 80 something by this time). There humor actually leans towards slapstick and the second story’s humor is less slapstick but makes one wonder if it was meant as commentary on Famer's days of earning a living by writing porn.

A decent read, but you're better off if you can find the original anthologies so you can sample some of the better creations such as Stalker, Doc Phoenix, Gypsy and Shin Bet (and another one I'll be writing about soon).

[Travis · Rating 3 out of 5]

Collects all of Farmers Greatheart Silver stories.
They're okay.

Farmer seems too caught up in clever ideas and they don't always translate into a good story.
The story of the last battle of the old, great pulp heroes is fun, but Greatheart being there is pointless.

I feel like a couple more stories and Farmer would have gotten all the jokey stuff out of his system and could have done some solid, adventures, but it just never happened.

[Little Timmy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great story by one of my top 5 writers. Greatheart Silver continues the tradition of the great pulp heroes. Very recommended

[Dave · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good solid fun

[Jim · Rating 3 out of 5]

solid farmer not one of his best but if you like the author it's worth reading.