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DARE

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In the sixteenth century some English colonists and American Indians were kidnapped by space-faring aliens called the Arra and put on a planet inhabited by another race of aliens known as the hostrels. The hostrels look like the fauns and satyrs of Greek myth and are far more sensitive, ecologically aware, and peace-loving than the humans. It is suggested that the two races have been thrown together by the Arra as an experiment to see if human beings can learn to not be so violent, greedy, and racist as they are on Earth. The reader will not be surprised that the wealthier humans form a KKK-style organization and conspire with the human government to launch a genocidal war on the hostrels, nor will the reader be surprised, if he is at all familiar with Farmer's oeuvre, that, Romeo and Juliet fashion, a human and a hostrel fall in love. About half way through the novel Farmer switches gears a bit, and we shift from the anti-witch hunt/anti-racism theme to something akin to an adventure story and then a military story that addresses issues of imperialism and technological change. Not bad.

I read the 1965 Ballantine paperback with the surprisingly racy pink cover.

A very early Philip Hosea Farmer novel. The book's themes are colonialism, racism, miscegenation and genocide and it hits you over the head rather bluntly with a murder, by a human, of a satyr - that is a male member of a gentle race known as the "horstel" (a contraction of horse tail). Ed Wang is a young hot headed swaggering racist and a member of a Klan like group known as the HK, or horstel killers. His cousin, Jack Cage (as in someone trapped) witnesses the event, and is coerced through social pressure to join. And the appellation HK could mean human killer as well.

Both horstrel and human have been deposited by a third race the Arra on the planet Dare, which is devoid of iron. The humans were drawn from 16th century Earth some from a missing caravan of Circassian slave girls captured in Turkey, others from wrecked Portuguese ships, but many from the legendary "lost" colony of Roanoke Virgina. Legend has it that humans have 500 years redeem to learn the peaceful ways of the horstrel. The two races have an uneasy truce through a series of pacts, but the human population has been rapidly growing. But behind the conspiracy is yet another conspiracy from the more technologically advanced human country of Socinians, who think that time is running out and that all humans need to be united in time so that they can develop the technology to fight the Arra and seize their ships when they arrive.

And then a ship from the stars arrives.

For Jack, who falls in love with the horstrel R'li, it's a matter of principles and loyalties to family, love, homeland, role and honour and how they get applied when the ground keeps shifting underneath. Like Richard Burton and Mark Twain in Farmer's Riverworld he finds that human character remains the same, but there is always the possibility of finding a higher purpose.

It's an enjoyable read because of the constantly changing perspectives and I really enjoyed the main characters of Jack, Chuckswilly and R'li, the extrapolated puritan society of the humans and the unusual nature and the psychologically based culture of the horstrel who turn out to be more advanced than we think. There are even skittish unicorns and some talking dragons thrown in for good measure. The edition I have is an unillustrated hardcover from 1980 with an interesting introduction by Moshe Feder and David G. Hartwell who point out some similarities to The Lovers along with some of Farmer's other stories.

very interesting premise with colorful characters. the book is short and leaves you wanting more storyline. an enjoyable read that ends a bit abruptly.