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Gor #33
Rebels of Gor
John Norman's epic Gorean Saga is one of the longest-running and most successful series in the history of fantasy. It is also one of the most controversial. Over the course of more than thirty books produced over a span of six decades, the series has sold millions of copies and built legions of fans unrivaled in their devotion.
Rebels of Gor is book 33 of the Gorean Saga. 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.
Rebels of Gor is book 33 of the Gorean Saga. 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.
654 pages, Paperback
First published October 13, 2013
19 people are currently reading
436 people want to read
About the author
John Norman
99 books338 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.
John Norman, real name John Lange, was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1931. His best known works, the Gor series, currently span 36 books written 1966 (Tarnsman of Gor) to 2021 (Avengers of Gor). Three installments of the Telnarian Histories, plus three other fiction works and a non-fiction paperback. Mr. Norman is married and has three children.
John Norman, real name John Lange, was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1931. His best known works, the Gor series, currently span 36 books written 1966 (Tarnsman of Gor) to 2021 (Avengers of Gor). Three installments of the Telnarian Histories, plus three other fiction works and a non-fiction paperback. Mr. Norman is married and has three children.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
December 8, 2013
The finale to an utterly gobsmacking series of 33 'Gor' based novels, and it doesn't disappoint, with the two warring shogunates at each other's throats up to the very end, and a surprising way of settling the stalemate. Some old friends return, some plotlines are tied off and some plot lines are left hanging - we will, I suppose, never now see Ko-Ro-Ba rebuilt, or what became of Elisabeth Cardwell (still a slave in Port Kar), nor Marlenus, or the two principle Kurii Zarendargar and Grendel, and what became of them.
Norman's trademark humour, dry as a good Martini, is brought into play, and the end battle is amazingly cinematic and strangely poetic.
This is the last book in the series, by all accounts. So farewell then, Tarl Cabot, literature's most infamous ginger! I'll miss you...
Norman's trademark humour, dry as a good Martini, is brought into play, and the end battle is amazingly cinematic and strangely poetic.
This is the last book in the series, by all accounts. So farewell then, Tarl Cabot, literature's most infamous ginger! I'll miss you...
April 9, 2015
This, supposedly last installment of the Gorian Saga, reminded me why I liked the books when I first encountered them back in the day. The story was compelling, only rarely did a kadjira bemoan the loss of her freedom and glorified the gaining of a slave collar, and there were many answered questions from previous books. I liked it, but it still does not feel like the end of the series.... I need to know more... If it is the end, then I am sorry... Can not believe I made it through soooo many slave-girl books in order to get to the end! I wish I knew what happened to Koroba...
November 29, 2014
Like how it summed up the whole series all the way back to Tarnsman of Gor.
August 20, 2017
Readers either love or loathe the Gor series by John Norman. My opinion of the books has changed drastically over the 45 years I've been reading them, they're not the easy breezy tales I once thought they were, they've become far less enjoyable (to me). I understand why Norman was blacklisted in the fantasy/sci-fi community in the eighties, he wears his misogyny like a badge of honor. Like them or not the Gor chronicles are a fantasy milestone.
REBELS OF GOR is not typical of the overall canon. REBELS overflows with a wow factor absent from the series for almost 40 years. First, and most noticeably, the usually predominant theme of slavery is almost nowhere in sight, only about 40 of the 644 pages of the novel are given over to it, approximately 5% of the book. That leaves over 600 pages of action-filled plot happening and John Norman crafts a story as serpentine as the one in ASSASSIN OF GOR. Read REBELS and you'll find out that's not just hyperbole. It truly is like the days of yore on Gor again: swordplay, political intrigue, large cast with character reversals, confronting/eluding the bad guys, breaking out of (and into) locked rooms, hand-to-hand combat with Kur, and more. After a couple of hundred pages of little or no slavery discussion at all I thought it so odd I asked myself had Norman written this book. He wrote it all right, it's just he hasn't written a Gor novel like REBELS since Ballantine published his books. Aside from a few insignificant loose ends, the series could've concluded with this 33rd volume (but Norman recently added #34, a dire return to misogyny).
At any rate, REBELS ends a six novel arc where, among other things, Tarl Cabot finally sails across mighty Thassa in a giant ship that's been spoken of since the sixth book of the series. The voyage takes up nearly all of MARINERS OF GOR, another engrossing read. The big boat finally docks on foreign shores and Cabot integrates into a samurai culture, gets in the middle of some shogun/daimyo warring factions, outsmarts not only the 'men of two swords' but the Priest-Kings and Kurii too. A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS and YOJIMBO are two movies inspired by, but nothing like, Dashiell Hammett's RED HARVEST; for a while I thought Norman was going to turn REBELS OF GOR into his own version of Yojimbo, but he did not. Even though I saw a few things coming chapters before they happened that did not lessen the reading experience for me.
The author John Norman turned 86 in 2017. In the last decade he's written well over a million words, most (but not all) of it stands with the best of what he published through Ballantine and Daw Books.
REBELS OF GOR is not typical of the overall canon. REBELS overflows with a wow factor absent from the series for almost 40 years. First, and most noticeably, the usually predominant theme of slavery is almost nowhere in sight, only about 40 of the 644 pages of the novel are given over to it, approximately 5% of the book. That leaves over 600 pages of action-filled plot happening and John Norman crafts a story as serpentine as the one in ASSASSIN OF GOR. Read REBELS and you'll find out that's not just hyperbole. It truly is like the days of yore on Gor again: swordplay, political intrigue, large cast with character reversals, confronting/eluding the bad guys, breaking out of (and into) locked rooms, hand-to-hand combat with Kur, and more. After a couple of hundred pages of little or no slavery discussion at all I thought it so odd I asked myself had Norman written this book. He wrote it all right, it's just he hasn't written a Gor novel like REBELS since Ballantine published his books. Aside from a few insignificant loose ends, the series could've concluded with this 33rd volume (but Norman recently added #34, a dire return to misogyny).
At any rate, REBELS ends a six novel arc where, among other things, Tarl Cabot finally sails across mighty Thassa in a giant ship that's been spoken of since the sixth book of the series. The voyage takes up nearly all of MARINERS OF GOR, another engrossing read. The big boat finally docks on foreign shores and Cabot integrates into a samurai culture, gets in the middle of some shogun/daimyo warring factions, outsmarts not only the 'men of two swords' but the Priest-Kings and Kurii too. A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS and YOJIMBO are two movies inspired by, but nothing like, Dashiell Hammett's RED HARVEST; for a while I thought Norman was going to turn REBELS OF GOR into his own version of Yojimbo, but he did not. Even though I saw a few things coming chapters before they happened that did not lessen the reading experience for me.
The author John Norman turned 86 in 2017. In the last decade he's written well over a million words, most (but not all) of it stands with the best of what he published through Ballantine and Daw Books.
November 22, 2025
For a Gor novel, this is a 4 star book. There is still lots of roundabout conversations, still a few too many dissertations on how a woman is a natural slave, and still too much dead space where action is space. But it also had quite a bit of action to it in places. Tarl acted un-Tarl like at a few moments, at least to my viewpoint.
What the book did feature was a reunion (finally) in the 6th book since Tarl collared her in Ar. And after all that anticipation, it was fairly anticlimactic. I wonder how it may play out in the series, but I don't know if we'll see.
What the book did feature was a reunion (finally) in the 6th book since Tarl collared her in Ar. And after all that anticipation, it was fairly anticlimactic. I wonder how it may play out in the series, but I don't know if we'll see.
November 14, 2021
Fairly sad
I read much of the gor series as a boy, too young to realize it was the DS aspect that was important... picking this up, as an adult, was... Interesting... but sad, in a particularly pathetic sense, where damaged and incomplete people try to justify their damage as " the natural way of things"
I read much of the gor series as a boy, too young to realize it was the DS aspect that was important... picking this up, as an adult, was... Interesting... but sad, in a particularly pathetic sense, where damaged and incomplete people try to justify their damage as " the natural way of things"
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews