Phileas fogg books in order8/11/2023 ![]() The novel I had was not in fact a newly released book as I had first thought, but merely a new edition, the original being released in 1973. Due to this, it wasn’t until I did some research of my own that I fully appreciated the cleverness of his fictional writing, and, feeling slightly foolish, found out that the author had actually died in 2009 and was not part of the fiction. Whilst I knew that the novel itself could not be true, none of these after-words dispelled the idea that the novel was somehow based on truth, such was the convincing nature of the writing. These relate to the detailed lineage of Phileas Fogg, including family trees, Fogg’s relation to the author (apparently deceased in 2009, although I wasn’t sure if this was also part of the fiction!) and the discussion of other characters who appear in the novel who are in fact cross-overs from other books. The novel is also unique (at least in the 2012 edition I read) in that it contains after-words in the form of essays and articles by other writers which keep up the pretence created by the novel. ![]() Indeed, in places it is hard to distinguish where one ends and the other begins. His attention to details such as important dates in the characters’ lives, character lineage, comparisons between this “unknown” version of the story and Verne’s version, and detailed description of real historical settings in the novel is such that the fictional elements become blurred into fact. Farmer purposefully writes to transform the classic characters found in the novel into real historical people and throughout, despite its obvious science fiction setting, I found myself questioning their fictionality. However, what sets this novel and in fact the ‘Wold Newton’ series it is a part of, apart from the rest, is not its storyline, as much as the convincing style of the writing. This action version of this well-known Victorian novel may seem quite fan-fiction esque and much like many other rewritings of the genre. In this version Farmer tells the reader how Phileas Fogg is in fact an adopted-alien secret agent, setting out to save his “race” from annihilation. In order to do this, he both consults and challenges Verne’s original text, questioning contradictions and gaps in the information and uses these to insert information that was “unknown” to Verne. However, what I was faced with was a heavily researched and cleverly worked companion guide to Verne’s novel in which a previously “unknown” log of Phileas Fogg exists that the author wishes to tell. Passing through exotic lands and dangerous locations, they seize whatever transportation is at hand - whether train or elephant - overcoming set-backs and always racing against the clock.When I first started reading Farmer’s novel after scanning the blurb, I had expected to find a conventional science fiction re-writing of Verne’s classic tale ‘Eighty Days around the World’. Breaking the well-established routine of his daily life, he immediately sets off for Dover with his astonished valet Passepartout. One night in the reform club, Phileas Fogg bets his companions that he can travel across the globe in just eighty days. Jules Verne's most famous adventure, now in a beautiful clothbound edition ![]() Passing through exotic lands and dangerous locations, they seize whatever transportation is at hand - whether train or elephant - overcoming set-backs. ![]()
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