Gor - La série

Je m'appelle Tarl Cabot. Mon père a disparu quand j'étais enfant. Longtemps je l'ai cru mort, jusqu'au jour où j'ai reçu son étrange message... J'étais parti camper, seul, dans les montagnes du New Hampshire. Je ramassais du bois pour faire un feu quand je m'arrêtai, surpris : quelque chose luisait dans l'obscurité. Une enveloppe métallique, d'un bleu phosphorescent. Je réussis à l'ouvrir en y appliquant l'empreinte de mon pouce. A l'intérieur, quelques mots de mon père : Ton destin est fixé et tu n'y échapperas pas... Ainsi commence la fantastique aventure de Tarl Cabot, qui va se réveiller sur Gor, aussi nommée l'Anti-Terre. Planète sœur de la Terre, de l'autre côté du soleil. Planète des Prêtres-Rois, des scribes, des assassins et des femmes esclaves... Monde à nul autre pareil, où les tarns, faucons géants, servent de monture aux guerriers...

Après sept longues années, Tarl est enfin rappelé sur Gor, soulagé de pouvoir rendosser son rôle de guerrier dominant, ainsi que de pouvoir retrouver Talena, sa Libre Compagne, et tous ses amis de la Cité de Ko-ro-ba. Malheureusement, c’est une bien mauvaise surprise qui l’attend : son nom a été sali, traîné dans la boue, sa ville n’est plus qu’un champ de ruines, et tous les gens qui l’aimaient ont été déclarés hors-la-loi. Il est temps pour Tarl de crier vengeance et de repartir au combat ! Et ses pas révoltés le mèneront jusqu’à Tharna, une cité étrange dominée par les femmes...

Elle est là, devant moi, la titanesque porte de bois noir qui sépare les sombres monts Sardar du reste de la planète Gor. On ne la franchit que dans un sens : de tous les hommes qui ont un jour osé pénétrer dans ces sinistres montagnes, aucun n'est jamais revenu. C'est pourtant ce que je m'apprête à faire, moi, Tarl Cabot, autrefois homme de la Terre et aujourd'hui guerrier goréen. C'est là, dans les Sardar, que vivent les mythiques prêtres-rois, responsables de la destruction de ma cité, Ko-ro-ba, et de la disparition de tous ceux que j'aimais. Entre eux et moi, c'est une affaire d'honneur et de sang... On dit des prêtres-rois qu'ils sont des demi-dieux jaloux, des maîtres cruels, omniscients et omnipotents. Mais je pressens déjà que la réalité dépasse de loin les plus folles des légendes...

Il y a très longtemps, les Prêtres-Rois de Gor ont confié en secret leur dernier œuf, l’espoir de tout un monde, aux Peuples des Chariots, d’intrépides nomades qui parcourent sans arrêt la planète et se fichent bien du système de caste qui régente le reste du monde. Tarl Cabot est le seul homme à ne pas trembler en leur présence – il est donc tout désigné pour tenter de s’intégrer à eux et de découvrir leur secret... Sûrement l’une des missions les plus périlleuses que l’audacieux guerrier ait jamais eu à mener sur Gor !

Bienvenue sur Gor, cette anti-Terre cachée de l’autre côté du Soleil, où une tout autre humanité vit selon des règles bien différentes, exotiques et brutales. Dans ce cinquième tome de la saga, le mortel assassin Kuurus se voit confier une sanglante vengeance pour mission. Son aventure le mènera des bras des esclaves de plaisir, rigoureusement formés aux arts de la séduction, jusqu’aux arènes de combats à main nue. Il sera le témoin d’affrontements violents, de conflits sanglants et des doutes des habitants de Gor, qui doivent tous faire face à leur destinée, qu’elle les mène à l’exaltation ou à l’avilissement le plus complet.

Les pas de Tarl Cabot le mènent cette fois à la cité la plus dépravée de tout Gor, Port Kar, peuplée de bandits, de hors-la-loi et d’esclaves fugitifs, la seule de tout Gor qui n’ait prêté allégeance à aucune cause ou aucun royaume, et qui n’a jamais été conquise. Dans les rues et les coupe-gorges de cette ville, un assassin aussi brutal et redoutable que Tarl ne peut que trouver le moyen de s’épanouir... d’autant plus que ses habitants sont célèbres pour avoir formé leurs esclaves de plaisir à l’obéissance la plus totale.

Sur Terre, la belle et forte tête Elinor Brinton était une brillante top-model new-yorkaise. Sur le monde impitoyable de Gor dans lequel elle a été jetée, elle n’est plus qu’une esclave de plaisir, séquestrée dans le camp d’un marchand. Obligée de tout apprendre de l’art de donner du plaisir aux hommes, Elinor ne pense qu’à s’échapper de ce cauchemar. Malheureusement, elle va se retrouver vendue à prix fort, à un maître qui est bien déterminé à en avoir pour son argent...

L’ancien Terrien Tarl Cabot, devenu sur Gor l’un des assassins les plus dangereux de la Caste des Guerriers, s’appelle désormais Bosk de Port-Kar, prospère marchand de la cité-pirate, et se rêve un avenir rempli de richesses... Mais le souvenir obsédant de son ancienne compagne Talena, son premier amour, le poussera bientôt à reprendre la mer, car on dit la belle jeune femme captive de cruelles chasseresses dont la réputation n’est plus à faire sur tout Gor.

Tarl Cabot était un guerrier fort et fier ; un héros dont on chante encore les victoires sur Gor. Désormais, terrassé par ses blessures, il n’est plus que l’ombre de lui-même. Mais lorsqu’il apprend la mort de sa belle Telima, dévorée par un Kur dans les marais du Vosk, son désir de vengeance est tel qu’il est près à reprendre les armes et à se lancer dans une aventure dangereuse et meurtrière.

« Livrez Gor ! » C’est le message que vient de faire parvenir les Kurii, depuis leur monde au-delà de Jupiter. Il semblerait qu’une invasion se prépare ; les dirigeants de Gor doivent s’y préparer. Cependant, ce genre d’ultimatum ne ressemble pas aux manières violentes et sanguinaires des Kurii. D’après Tarl Cabot, la réponse à ce mystère se trouve dans le pays des Dunes où étrangement les relations entre les tribus sont des plus instables ces derniers temps...

Sur Terre, Judy Thornton était étudiante en littérature à l'université. Elle écrivait des poèmes et avait tous les garçons à ses pieds... mais désormais, prisonnière de Gor, elle n'est plus qu'une esclave errant dans la sauvagerie de cette planète où les femmes n'existent que pour le plaisir des hommes. Ce que ses maîtres ignorent cependant, c'est que Judy n'est pas juste une jolie captive - elle détient en elle le pouvoir de détruire Gor et tout ce qui s'y rapporte. Un pouvoir qui lance à sa poursuite des forces haut placées... forces qui feraient mieux de ne pas sous-estimer la jeune femme et le fait qu'elle détienne le destin de toute la planète entre ses mains !

Sur Gor coexistent des castes très différentes : il y a les Kurii, des extraterrestres qui s’apprêtent à envahir la planète depuis l’espace ; les guerriers goréens, qui combattent avec une voracité presque primitive dans leur soif de sang ; et puis il y a les femmes esclaves, utilisées comme des bêtes par les hommes, pour le travail ou le plaisir. Il est temps de raconter comment ces trois types de bêtes différents combattent et se débattent, et cette incroyable aventure commencera dans les terres désertiques brûlantes et finira dans le froid mordant des terres polaires, parmi les redoutables chasseurs de la banquise.

Tarl Cabot se lance dans la quête la plus importante de sa vie. Les Prêtres-Rois ont découvert qu’un étrange explorateur a en sa possession un artefact qui pourrait bien menacer leur toute puissance. Tarl Cabot est donc sommé de retrouver cet explorateur et de le délester de l’anneau de pouvoir tant redouté. Sa quête le mènera à travers les territoires les plus sauvages de Gor, à la rencontre de créatures et d’hommes aussi fascinants que sanguinaires.

Jason Marshall est désespéré. Sa bien-aimée a été enlevée pour être réduite en esclavage dans un monde étrange nommé Gor. Jason serait prêt à tout pour la sauver s’il n’avait pas lui-même été capturé... Esclave combattant, il devra se battre pour recouvrer sa liberté et tenter de sauver celle qu’il aime. Mais avant cela, il lui faudra survivre aux terribles épreuves qui l’attendent sur Gor.

Après avoir découvert le monde de Gor en tant qu’esclave, Jason Marshall doit désormais faire ses preuves pour survivre sur cette planète étrangère. Bien décidé à retrouver la femme de son cœur qui avait été enlevée et emportée sur Gor elle aussi, Jason se retrouve plongé dans une guerre dont il ignore tout. Gor est un monde impitoyable, Jason devra en apprendre les règles s’il souhaite un jour retrouver celle qu’il aime.

Thrust into a life full of woeful twists and turns, Jason Marshall has contended with the prehistoric customs and immeasurable power of the Goreans. His struggles on Gor, a planet resembling Earth, included escaping imprisonment, enslavement, and redeeming lost land. Jason has fought to regain control of his life. Having ascended to a position of power in the Gorean army, Jason must prevail in a battle that seems destined to destroy Gor. Jason has a lot riding on his success as a war leader: prestige, wealth, and an Earth girl of goddesslike beauty. Will Jason be able to win the war and avoid a fate worse than death? Will he be able to find the girl who holds his affections? Will he be able to live as a free man on Earth's counterpart and rise to a still higher position of power and respect?

Long ago in their intraspecific conflicts, a violent, technologically sophisticated life form, the Kurii, destroyed their native world. They now seek another. Between Earth and Gor, or the Counter-Earth, and the power of the imperialistic, predatory Kurii, now ensconced in the “Steel Worlds,” a number of satellite colonies concealed amongst the debris of the asteroid belt, stands only the defensive might of the Priest-Kings of Gor. Tarl Cabot, once of Bristol, England, laboring on behalf of the Priest-Kings, once managed to foil a Kur attempt to set the stage for an invasion of Gor. But to pursue this mission, Cabot must enter and traverse the Barrens, the vast Eastern prairies of the primary Gorean continent, lands contested by tribes of warring savages, lands forbidden to strangers. Rediscover this brilliantly imagined world where men are masters and women live to serve their every desire.

In this book is concluded the adventure which began in the 17th book in the Gorean series, Savages of Gor. Half-Ear, or Zarendargar, a Kur general fallen from favor in the Steel Worlds, now sought by a death squad of his savage compeers, has determined to lure his pursuers into the Barrens, the vast prairies to the east of known Gor, populated by warring tribes known to Goreans as the Red Savages. He has arranged matters in such a way that he will be abetted in his stand against the death squad, and its human allies, by a human ally of his own, his former foe, Tarl Cabot. The ancestors of the Red Savages, as those of many other Goreans, were brought to Gor long ago in Voyages of Acquisition by the Priest-Kings. The Red Savages were settled in an area not unlike that of their former home, a sweeping, almost endless grassland, where they tend to continue their former ways of life, and war. The various tribes have in common a tradition, or myth, called the Memory. And in virtue of this tradition, myth or memory, they entertain an inveterate hostility to lighter-skinned races. Cabot makes his way into this land, and amongst these tribes, in his quest for Zarendargar, he encounters enemies and perils, conflicts and hatreds, and, ultimately, friends. And meets once more the dreadful Zarendargar.

In their contentions with Priest-Kings, Kurii, savage denizens of the Steel Worlds concealed within the asteroid belt, have frequently had recourse to human allies and subversion. In accord with such projects, Kurii have occasionally sought to place and support congenial administrations in key cities. One such city is Corcyrus. Corcyrus is ruled by a beautiful woman, the cruel, arrogant, much-hated Sheila, an agent of Kurii. It is thought to be advisable to find a double for Sheila, who, in case of military or political disaster, may serve as her proxy or substitute. For this role, an unwitting young Earth girl, Tiffany Collins is chosen and brought to Gor. Tiffany, fleeing for her life, finds herself alone, frightened, and friendless, a vulnerable Earth female, no more than a lovely, defenseless barbarian on the beautiful, perilous world of Gor. Rediscover this brilliantly imagined world where men are masters and women live to serve their every desire.

The games of Gor are diverse, as are their players. There are the games of planetary politics, in which worlds are contested. And those of cities and ubarates, of ponderous cavalries and fleets of lateen-rigged ships. And smaller games, bloody games, played on a square of sand, in which the counters and pieces are edged weapons. And, too, there is Kaissa, common on Gor, played with pieces of wood, on a board of a hundred squares. The major land power in the northern latitudes of known Gor has long been the imperium of mighty Ar. Against her hegemonies on the continent, plans by her major enemies, the maritime ubarates of Cos and Tyros, have been carefully drawn to involve attack from without and subversion from within. Cabot, once of Earth, is drawn into these intrigues. Rediscover this brilliantly imagined world where men are masters and women live to serve their every desire.

On Gor, there are numerous mercenary companies—some larger, some smaller—whose services may be purchased or bid upon for given periods of time. The allegiance of these companies is to their pay and their captains. The forces of Cos and Tyros, powerful maritime ubarates, and their allies have now beached upon the mainland and are utilizing the city of Torcodino as a repository for supplies, in preparation to march on a nigh-undefended and unprepared Ar. Should Ar fall, the disinterested tolerances and neutralities, and even the balance of power long sustained between Ar and the great maritime ubarates—things that made the existence of the independent companies possible—will vanish, a development threatening the very existence of the independent companies. But when Cabot arrives in Ar, it is a city rife with doubt, dissension, and treason. To whom shall the letters be delivered, and whom can he trust? Rediscover this brilliantly imagined world where men are masters and women live to serve their every desire.

Doreen Williamson is a quiet, shy librarian on Earth. Like many other young women, she is distrustful of her attractions, frightened of men, introverted in manner and sexually inhibited. She lives within a quiet, lonely, dissatisfying, sheltered, frustrated desperation, distant from her true self, her nature denied, her only friends books and her secret thoughts. In the realization and enactment of a profound fantasy, after acute self-conflict, she dares to study a form of dance in which she is at last free to move her body as a female, a form of dance in which she may revel in her beauty and womanhood, a form of dance historically commanded by masters of selected, suitable slaves: belly dance. She must then dance, for the first time, before men. In doing so, she discovers her own desirability and that she may be well bid upon. Rediscover this brilliantly imagined world where men are masters and women live to serve their every desire.

The maritime ubarate of Cos and her allies are mounting an attack on Ar on two fronts, from the South with a major invasion force and in the North with an expeditionary force besieging Ar’s Station, Ar’s base of power in the vast arable basin of Gor’s mightiest river, the Vosk. Dietrich of Tarnburg, a mercenary, has seized Torcodino, with its stores of military supplies, to temporarily halt the march of Cos on Ar in order to buy Ar time to organize for her defense. Cabot has delivered letters from Dietrich to the regent of Ar, apprising him of the situation at Torcodino. Tarl escapes his imprisonment and ponders whether he should then flee Ar’s Station, making his way to freedom through its miseries and desolations, its ruins and flames, or shall he remain, to defend her weakened, betrayed, starving defenders, those who had been his very captors? Rediscover this brilliantly imagined world where men are masters and women live to serve their every desire.

Cabot and his friend Marcus, of Ar’s Station, who have been spying for Ar in the Cosian encampments, now seek the long-inert forces of Ar to report acquired intelligence to their commander, Saphronicus, who proves to be of the treasonous party of Ar. Cabot and Marcus are placed under arrest, as spies. Primary forces of Ar, largely inactive in recent months, are now to pursue Cosian forces withdrawing from Ar’s Station, through the vast Vosk delta to the sea. The Cosian forces, however, have avoided the delta, and the delta campaign is a ruse to decimate the armed might of Ar, to use as a weapon the marshes and swamps of the delta itself, their treacherous, trackless wildernesses and wastes, the quicksand, the insects, the serpents and reptiles, the local populations, to deliver a final decisive blow to what was once the unchallenged splendor and power of Gor’s finest infantry. Rediscover this brilliantly imagined world where men are masters and women live to serve their every desire.

After the disaster of the delta campaign, Ar is essentially defenseless. The forces of Cos and her allies are welcomed into the city as liberators. Ar’s Station, which held out so valiantly against superior forces in the North, is denounced as traitorous. Veterans of the delta campaign are despised and ridiculed. Patriotism and manhood are denigrated. Lawlessness and propaganda are rampant. Marlenus, the great ubar, who might have organized and led a resistance, who might have rallied the city, is presumed dead, somewhere in the Voltai Mountains. Tarl is concerned with a warrior’s vengeance upon sedition and treachery, and, in particular, with meeting one who stands high among the conspirators—a beautiful woman now enthroned as ubara, whose name is Talena. Rediscover this brilliantly imagined world where men are masters and women live to serve their every desire.

Ar, defeated, shamed, and systematically looted, is occupied by Cosian forces. Perhaps Marlenus of Ar alone, the great ubar, could remind the men of their Home Stone and its meaning. But it is thought that he perished in the Voltai. Young women from Earth brought to Gor are commonly taken to the markets to be branded, collared, and sold as the delicious, lovely livestock they are. Such is the case of a young woman whom we shall call Janice, for that was her Gorean slave name. In the prison pits of piratical Treve there exists a chained prisoner who believes himself to be of the Gorean peasantry. The nature and even the existence of this prisoner, strangely enough, is a closely guarded secret. In order to better keep this secret, it is decided that his servant and warder had best not be a native Gorean. Rediscover this brilliantly imagined world where men are masters and women live to serve their every desire.

Ellen is a beautiful young slave girl on the planet Gor. Yet she was not always thus. For nearly sixty years she was a woman of Earth, but life had largely passed her by. Then, following an apparently chance encounter at the opera with a strangely familiar young man, an echo from her past, she finds herself transported from Earth to Gor. Here she discovers the true identity of her kidnapper and his sinister motives. She is given a strange drug that reverses the aging process, turning back time itself, and once again she's the beautiful young woman she remembers from years before, so long ago. Now her adventures really begin. Ellen finds herself a slave in the mighty Gorean city of Ar, where the harsh rule of the occupying forces of Cos and their mercenary allies is being challenged by the mysterious Delta Brigade. Surrounded by intrigue, rumors, plots, and betrayal, her adventures bring her face to face with strange and terrifying beasts, and sickeningly familiar weapons. Men challenge one another to own her. To the victor the spoils, but who will that victor be? Her fate is decided in this latest thrilling installment of John Norman's best selling Gorean Saga.

Some might suppose that the Kurii are monsters, but that is distinctly unfair. They are merely another life form. The Kur is often eight to ten feet in height, if it should straighten its body, and several hundred pounds in weight, and is clawed, fanged, long armed, agile, and swift, often moving on all fours when it wishes to move most rapidly, and that is far faster than a man can run. It does not apologize for its strength, its speed, its formidableness. Nor does it attempt to conceal them. Once, it seems, the Kur race had a planet of their own, but somehow, apparently by their own hands, it was rendered unviable, either destroyed or desolate. So they searched for a new home, and in our solar system found not one but two suitable planets, planets they set their minds to conquering. But these planets, Earth and its sister planet Gor, the Counter-Earth, were not undefended. Four times have the Kur attempted their conquest, only to be beaten back by the mysterious Priest-Kings, rulers of Gor. As the Kurii lurk deep within an asteroid belt, awaiting the chance to seize their prize, their attention is drawn to a human, Tarl Cabot. Cabot was once an agent of Priest-Kings, but is now their prisoner, held captive in a secret prison facility. But what is their interest in Tarl Cabot? Whatever it may be, one thing soon becomes clear - that Tarl Cabot is a man to be taken seriously.

Fresh from his exploits in the Steel Worlds, home of the Kurii, a savage alien race intent on conquering Gor, Tarl Cabot has been returned to an isolated beach, at coordinates apparently specified by the Priest-Kings, the masters of Gor and the enemy of the Kurii. His only companions are his beautiful new slave Cecily and Ramar, a ferocious sleen bred in the Steel Worlds to hunt and kill. But why has he been returned to such a remote spot? Did the Priest-Kings wish their former agent to serve them once more? Did the Kurii intend to use Cabot to further their own ends? The truth, as Tarl will learn, is darker and deeper than either of these possibilities. Rediscover this brilliantly imagined world where men are masters and women live to serve their every desire.

Many on Gor do not believe the great ship of Tersites, the lame, scorned, half-blind, half-mad shipwright, originally of Port Kar, exists. Surely it is a matter of no more than legend. In the previous book, however, Swordsmen of Gor, we learned that the great ship, commissioned by unusual warriors for a mysterious mission, was secretly built in the northern forests and brought down the Alexandra to Thassa, the sea, beginning her voyage to the “World’s End,” hazarding waters beyond the “farther islands,” from which no ship had returned. Rediscover this brilliantly imagined world where men are masters and women live to serve their every desire.

The 31st volume of the series, the 7th narrative from a female viewpoint, and the 1st book written for a Gorean audience; CONSPIRATORS OF GOR follows up on the alien war between Kurii and Priest-Kings which escalated in book 28, KUR OF GOR. The leading character, a young woman by the name Allison Ashton-Baker, involved in playing Gorean games on Earth, is transported to Ar to become a major witness of the unfolding events. We meet again with Lord Grendel, the result of a failed experiment to mix the genes of humans and Kurii; the Lady Bina, former pet of Agamemnon, she who dreams of becoming Ubara of Ar; and Agamemnon himself, Eleventh face of the Nameless One, the illustrious mastermind behind the Kurrian invasion. Packed with action, and, as usual, presented with a spicy dressing of cultural relativism and critical remarks on modernity and gender relations. One word - brilliant!

In what constitutes a prequel to Mariners of Gor, we learn that a mysterious cargo, suitably disguised, was covertly placed on the great ship, a cargo that might influence the outcome of the aforementioned gamble. One narrator is a young woman, once a Miss Margaret Alyssa Cameron, and the other is an individual whose name, for reasons that will become obvious, is withheld in the manuscript. It does seem clear, however, that the individual referred to was somehow instrumental in bringing the former Miss Cameron to the height of a large slave block in the coastal city of Brundisium, one of Gor’s major ports. Rediscover this brilliantly imagined world where men are masters and women live to serve their every desire.

John Norman takes you on a journey to “World’s End,” a set of once-unknown islands far west of the continental mainland. Lying across vast, turbulent Thassa, these mysterious islands were reached for the first time during the historic voyage of the ship of Tersites. Now this remote locale has been chosen by two warring, technologically advanced species—the bestial, imperialistic, predatory Kurii, and the retiring, secretive Priest-Kings, the “gods of Gor.” On this all-too-real “gaming board,” a roll of the dice will determine the fortunes and fate of Gor—and perhaps that of Earth. Few realize the momentous nature of the conflict, seeing in it no more than a local war for territory and power. Those who grasp the dimensions of the game realize that the stakes are nothing less than the world itself. Rediscover this brilliantly imagined world where men are masters and women live to serve their every desire.