Tschai, Planet of Adventure Books
Marooned on the strange planet Tschai, Adam Reith agreed to lead an expedition to return the princess Ylin Ylan, the Flower of Cath, to her homeland halfway around the globe. Monsters of land and sea lay before them, and beings both human and alien who might rob, kill or enslave them. Tschai was a large planet, an ancient planet, where four powerful alien races struggled for mastery while humans were treated as pawns; nothing would be easy for Reith on this journey. But the girl's father was enormously wealthy and her homeland technologically sophisticated. If Reith was ever to obtain human aid in returning to Earth, where better than Cath? If he could get there... SERVANTS OF THE WANKH, complete in itself, is the second volume of Jack Vance's masterwork interplanetary saga.
The Pnume are native to Tschai, living underground in a vast network of caverns with their human slave-species, the Pnumekin. Historians of Tschai, the Pnume collect its past with scholarly disinterest; they hear rumors of Adam Reith - a man who claims to come from another planet, named Earth - and they want him for permanent display in Foreverness, museum of Tschai life! Reith must survive the Pnume tunnels, if he is ever to return to Earth.TschaiThe Pnume is part 4 of 4 of TschaiTschai is a planet orbiting the star Carina 4269, 212 light-years from Earth. It is populated by three alien, mutually hostile species; the displaced, native Pnume; and various human races, some of whom live as slaves or clients of the aliens. Each of the four novels relates Reith's adventures with one of the species, and is named after that species.
His exploration ship blasted from orbit, Terran scout Adam Reith is stranded on Tschai, a world colonized by three alien species -- the Chasch, the Dirdir, and the Wannek -- while the planet's original inhabitants, the mysterious Pnume, lurk underground. In the first book of the four-volume cycle, Reith falls in with a barbaric tribe of free humans, each weirdly ruled by the hereditary symbolic badge he wears. To recover his wrecked scout craft, he embarks on a perilous journey to the decadent Chasch city of Dadiche, accompanied by Traz, a teenage barbarian, Anacho, an escaped slave of the birdlike Dirdir, and Ylin-Ylan, a princess rescued from a brutal cult. In Dadiche, one slip will bring certain death. Tschai is grandmaster Jack Vance at his unparalleled adventure-spinning peak. – Matt Hughes The Chasch is Book I of the Tschai (Planet of Adventure) sequence, and Volume 34 of the Spatterlight Press Signature Series.Released in the centenary of the author's birth, this handsome new collectionis based upon the prestigious Vance Integral Edition. Select volumes enjoyup-to-date maps, and many are graced with freshly-written forewords contributedby a distinguished group of authors. Each book bears a facsimile of theauthor's signature and a previously-unpublished photograph, chosen from family archives for the period the book was written. These uniquefeatures will be appreciated by all, from seasoned Vance collector to new reader sampling the spectrum of this author's influential work forthe first time. – John Vance II
The four Planet of Adventure volumes chronicle Adam Reith's saga on the planet Tschai, under the amber glow of the star Carina 4269. Reith is a Terran first-in scout stranded on a planet which he learns is now occupied, after an ancient struggle which has come to a standstill, by three technically advanced cultures who now guardedly share the surface while the original inhabitants- the mysterious Pnume- dwell in subterranean depths. On Tschai, Reith discovers to his surprise (and disgust) Earth-derived humans whom the three off-world cultures imported long ago, who have undergone physical and perceptual modifications to closely mimic their masters. The enslaved humans retain however that most human of traits- ruthless self-interest. In The Chasch, Reith encounters a handful of free humans ranging the face of Tschai, and begins his quest to secure a space-worthy craft with which to return to Earth. Resourcefulness is Reith's byword as his odyssey takes him among the domains of aliens, humans, and their various collateral societies. In the final book of the omnibus, Vance introduces the Pnume, one of his most enigmatic and incomprehensible creations. Forced to live in the depths of Tschai by the long-ago surface struggle between the invading aliens, the Pnume have occupied themselves within an eternal obsession for collecting and preserving Tschai's historical oddities. Reith is horrified to discover that they seek to exhibit him in their Museum of Foreverness. Jack Vance is at his best as he introduces the cultures and beings who make up the chaotic population of this ancient planet. Reith's path to return to Earth is thorny and fraught with constant threats. His epic tale is a masterpiece of story-telling. Cover art by David Russell