The Totems of Abydos

On a primitive planet, the missing link may be the aliens living there in this novel of discovery and danger from the author of the Gorean Saga.
 
In a far-off future, two anthropologists—gross, powerful, dissolute Emilio Rodriguez, and aspiring, young, naïve Allan Brenner, who, unbeknownst to himself, carries ancient genes of a sort no longer welcome on Home World—have been assigned to conduct a study on Abydos, a deeply forested wilderness planet of little note whose only evidence of civilization is a single enclave: small, rough, dingy Company Station, a fueling station occasionally utilized by star freighters. 
 
Within the forest, some days from Company Station, are the Pons, a group of small, simian‑type organisms that seem near the crossroads between animal and rational creature, between nature and culture. They would appear to constitute an ideal object of study with respect to the origins and foundations of civilization. How it came about, so to speak, that something once emerged from the lair, or cave, that was so radically different? What lies at the beginning? 
 
The results of the study have already been politically prescribed on Home World, that the Pons are to shed light on humanity, that it is, in its original and unspoiled nature, polite, sweet, kind, deferent, diffident, social, noncompetitive, and innocent. Both Rodriguez and Brenner have a trait in common, however, which may explain why they have been sent—exiled, in a sense—to such an out‑of‑the‑way locale. Both seek the truth. They enter the forest. 

John Norman, born in Chicago, Illinois, in 1931, is the creator of the Gorean Saga, the longest-running series of adventure novels in science fiction history. Starting in December 1966 with Tarnsman of Gor, the series was put on hold after its twenty-fifth installment, Magicians of Gor, in 1988, when DAW refused to publish its successor, Witness of Gor. After several unsuccessful attempts to find a trade publishing outlet, the series was brought back into print in 2001. Norman has also produced a separate science fiction series, the Telnarian Histories, plus two other fiction works (Ghost Dance and Time Slave), a nonfiction paperback (Imaginative Sex), and a collection of thirty short stories, entitled Norman Invasions. The Totems of Abydos was published in spring 2012. 

All of Norman’s work is available both in print and as ebooks. The Internet has proven to be a fertile ground for the imagination of Norman’s ever-growing fan base, and at Gor Chronicles (www.gorchronicles.com), a website specially created for his tremendous fan following, one may read everything there is to know about this unique fictional culture. 

Norman is married and has three children.