General Information
===================
 Title:                  Priest-Kings of Gor
 Author:                 John Norman
 Read By:                Ralph Lister
Treeware:              1968
 Audiobook:          2010
 Genre:                  Fantasy
 Publisher:           Brilliance Audio
 Series Name:     Gor: Chronicles of Counter Earth
 Position in Series:     3

File Information
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 Number of MP3s:         47
 Total Duration:         12:44:28
 Total MP3 Size:         525.23
 Parity Archive:         20% Par 2
 Encoded At:             CBR 96 kbit/s 44100 Hz Mono
 ID3 Tags:               Set, v2.3
 no reposts

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Book Description
================
This is the third installment of John Norman's popular and controversial 
Gor series. Tarl Cabot is the intrepid tarnsman of the planet Gor, a 
harsh society with a rigid caste system that personifies the most brutal 
form of social Darwinism. In this volume, Tarl must search for the truth 
behind the disappearance of his beautiful wife, Talena. Have the ruthless 
priest-kings destroyed her? Tarl vows to find the answer for himself, 
journeying to the mountain stronghold of the kings, knowing full well 
that no one who has dared approach the priest-kings has ever returned 
alive....


This is the first Gor book that I have read. I have known about them for decades but had dismissed them as trash without ever having read one because of their reputation for misogyny and the promotion of bondage. During a recent trip to a used book I came across a copy of Priest-Kings of Gor with a cover by Boris Vallejo that intrigued me. It showed a barbarian standing over a slave girl with what I took to be a golden idol of a gigantic insectoid creature in the background. (As it turned out, the "idol" was a living Priest-King!) I was in the mood for "guilty pleasure" so I bought it. I expected to get slam-bang action, lurid writing, a no-brainer story, and lots of politically incorrect pornography. Boy, was I wrong! The story has its share of action but it also has a fair amount of exposition and character development. The writing is far from lurid. It actually has a somewhat stilted feeling to it that I associate more with Victorian prose than with modern writing. The story was reasonably complex and the cultural background was surprisingly detailed. What impresses me most about this book, however, is the convincing presentation of an alien with a truly ALIEN perspective, the Priest-King of Gor, an intelligent creature whose sensorium is based on olfaction rather than vision. I've been reading science fiction for more than 40 years and I can't think of a book that has done it better. Oh, yeah, the bondage stuff. It's there but not as prominent as in the other Gor books, I'm told. And there is no pornography...whatever sex there is in this book (I don't remember any!) occurs offstage. Nevertheless, anyone with feminist views is advised to stay as far away from this book as possible. For everyone else it's a hell of a good read! 

Requests:

The Galactic Gourmet
Unabridged
By 
James White
# 11 in the Sector General Series 
Available from LOC\NLS only as far as I know.


Paddling the Pacific:
The Happy Isles Of Oceania (non fiction)
Unabridged
By
Paul Theroux
This title is probably only available from tape.

Travels in Siberia (non fiction)
Unabridged
By
Ian Frazier 