Venus on the Half-Shell
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Venus on the Half-Shell was first published in two parts beginning in the December 1974 issue of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. It is a science fiction novel attributed to the fictional author Kilgore Trout but actually written by Philip José Farmer. Kilgore Trout is a recurring character of many of the novels of Kurt Vonnegut and this book was first mentioned as a fictional work in his novel God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater (1965).
It is said that Vonnegut was "not amused" by Venus on the Half-Shell, especially since it was popularly assumed that he wrote it. This problem was solved by the book being reprinted under Farmer's by-line.
The book claims that the Bible falsely accuses Merneptah, king of Egypt, of being the Pharaoh of the Exodus. However, the name "Merneptah" is not in the Bible, and the ruler of Egypt during the Exodus is called only "Pharaoh."
A common theme of the novel is to use anagrams for names of the characters.
