Shortly after his death in 1890, British explorer, linguist, and writer Richard Francis Burton reawakens in a massive chamber filled with bodies suspended in mid-air. He is then confronted by men in a flying craft who fire upon him, knocking him unconscious.
Burton and many others from the chamber are revived, hairless and naked, along the shores of a massive river in what at first appears to be paradise. Although for some, it does not resemble the afterlife as described by their religious doctrine.
It is soon learned that they had been resurrected from different eras of Earth’s history from Neanderthal through the 21st century—including an extraterrestrial from Tau Ceti who died on Earth in 2008.
Each is equipped with a container, later called a “grail,” tethered to his or her wrist. As they explore this pastoral land, noticably devoid of animal and insect life, the people discover large rocks every few miles. These “grailstones” provide supplies including many of the familiar foods and beverages of Earth as well as cigarettes, marijuana, and a “dream gum” that induces everything from hallucinations to loss of sexual inhibitions.
For mutual protection, Burton forms a group consisting of a Neanderthal who calls himself Kazz, a 20th century science fiction writer named Peter Frigate, the famous Victorian-era aristocrat Alice Liddell-Hargreaves, and Monat, the alien from Tau Ceti.
Eventually, Burton and his group build a crude sailboat and make their way down the river until, after a lengthy battle, they are captured and brought into a village ruled by none other than former Nazi leader Hermann Göring and Tullus Hostilius, the third King of Rome. Burton leads a successful escape from the village during which, Göring is killed—albeit temporarily. Almost everyone who dies on the river world is eventually resurrected elsewhere.
More importantly, Burton and company capture an agent of the “Ethicals,” the scientifically advanced beings who modified the planet onto which they resurrected millons of Earth’s dead. However, the man commits suicide before providing any helpful information.
Burton, now a target of the Ethicals, continues his quest to uncover their true motives—even if he has to die nearly a thousand deaths to do so.
To Your Scattered Bodies Go (1971) is the first book in Philip Jose Farmer’s groundbreaking magnum opus Riverworld saga, which continued with The Fabulous Riverboat (1971), The Dark Design (1977), The Magic Labrynth (1980), Gods of Riverworld (1983), River of Eternity (1983) and a few anthologies. Each book introduces true figures from Earth history including Richard Francis Burton, Alice Hargreaves, Samuel Clemens, Tom Mix, Mozart, Cyrano de Bergerac, Jack London, Marcellin Marbot, King John of England, Baron Lothar Siegfried von Richthofen, and others.
No science fiction reader’s journey should be considered complete without a journey to Farmer’s Riverworld.
In the distant future, the two major political powers on Earth consist of Soviet North America and the Argentinian-South African coalition (aka the South Atlantic Axis). The uneasy truce between them is shattered when the planet is destroyed in a nuclear holocaust.
I read this collection of 27 speculative fiction tales immediately after 
This marvelous collection of 24 stories includes such gems as “Fair Game,” “The Hanging Stranger,” “The Last of the Masters,” “War Veteran,” “Exhibit Piece,” “Sales Pitch,” “The Chromium Fence,” and several tales that were adopted into film, such as “We Can Remember it for You Wholesale” (Total Recall, 1990), “The Minority Report” (Minority Report, 2002), “The Golden Man” (Next, 2007), and “Second Variety” (Screamers, 1995).
One of Jack Vance’s most influential works and the first in a series, The Dying Earth is comprised of six fantasy adventures that are tangentially connected. They take place in Earth’s far future, during a time when the sun is approaching the end of its life and has become, it seems, a red dwarf. The human population has diminished significantly and most of the planet’s history long forgotten.
Perhaps the last remnants of the human race eke out a meager existence on the unforgiving world of Aerlith, on which much of the terrain is little more than a craggy, mountainous wasteland. The two major and opposing settlements on Aerlith are concentrated in two valleys, each containing the only fertile soil on the planet. These forces are led by the cunning and logical Joaz Banbeck and capricious, volatile Ervis Carcolo, respectively. Carcolo, ruler of Happy Valley, is intent on destroying Banbeck and laying claim to his territory, known as Banbeck Vale.