Witch World by Andre Norton

Simon Tregare is a professional soldier who has somehow gotten into trouble with some criminals, and expects to be killed very soon, so he is enjoying a last meal at leisure. He is approached at his table by a man he knows only by reputation, who claims he can extricate him permanently from the mess he's landed in, never to be tracked down by the thugs pursuing him. The key to this, of course, turns out to be a method by which he is transported to an entirely different world than ours, without any way to return. Seeing no other course of action available to him which will save his life, he consents, and is sent off to...The Witch World!
A venerable tradition in 50s and 60s science fiction, the mysterious transport to another world, it was used by Edgar Rice Burroughs in his novels of John Carter of Mars and Carson of Venus, and by John Norman in his Gor series (gotta review some of those one day), and by several others that I can recall. Sure saves on long space voyages, anyway.

Upon arrival, Simon is immediately greeted by a troop of soldiers chasing a pitiful girl dressed only in rags, across a blasted heath. What else is a classical hero to do but to defend and rescue the "princess"? He kills a couple of the men with his pistol (which amazingly still works in this world of magic), then helps the girl take refuge on a cliffside, where she demonstrates that she's not just some poor little servant wench, but has mystical powers of her own - she calls down a thunderstorm upon her pursuers. Drenched by the storm that does not pass quickly, Simon keeps her warm throughout the night with the heat of his own body. Naw, get your minds out of the gutter, this was written in the sixties, and heroes back then didn't get to have sex...ever. Well, maybe offstage after the end of the book.

Turns out the witch, whose name we don't find out until the final pages of the novel, we just call her Lady or "the witch", is one of the leaders of a nation, Estcarp, beset by enemies on all sides, and Simon will join her loyal underlings in defending his new home. The witches that rule Estcarp have special powers, to one degree or another, such as calling down storms, casting illusions, creating love potions, and possibly a few other things I've forgotten.

They only maintain their powers if they abstain from sexual activity (I told you this was the early sixties, before the sexual revolution), and one of the innovative ways their enemies neutralize them is to subject any captured witches to gang rape (again, mostly offstage and euphemistically). I'm not sure how all this actually is supposed to work. First, if they lose their powers when they have sex, how has the race survived? Did they nominate one witch in each generation to be the breeder and have lots of children? Second, I can kind of understand the bargain of giving up your magic powers as a trade for romantic love, your focus would no longer be on your magic, and the buildup of energies would be dissipated...fine. But to lose your powers as an unwilling participant? Well, maybe due to trauma, but in that case the voluntary act wouldn't or shouldn't be a disqualifier. Anyway, like much in SF and Fantasy at times, it doesn't have to make sense, it's only there so that Lady can be rescued from a "fate worse than death", anyway.

There's lots of battles and intrigue, but after decades of reading both good and bad fantasy, I'm afraid I no longer have as high an opinion of Norton's writing as I once did. There's far better stories out there, and this one just seems tired, fifty years later. I was going to re-read the whole series, but I think I'll pass now.

Uncharted Stars by Andre Norton

Uncharted Stars is the somewhat uninspired sequel to The Zero Stone. Most of the exciting elements that were present in the first novel are missing here, and the only scene that contains a great deal of action is when Murdoc and Eet invade Waystar, the secret lair of the Guild built on a Forerunner space station in a dead sector of space. The rest of seems like Norton felt she had to finish the duo's story, but really wasn't all that excited about it.

Flush with the loot from their reward for turning over the zero stone ring to the Patrol, Murdoc and Eet have purchased a ship, and are trying to find a pilot. Somebody has blacklisted them, however, so they have to search the dregs of the spaceport to find a drug-addled delisted pilot, Rizk (risky?) to take them on the next stage of their treasure hunt. Murdoc's first trading venture doesn't go as well as he had hoped, when he is out-bargained by a more experienced trader, so he makes a quick change of plans to turn a profit after all.

But, when he returns to civilization with some beautiful and valuable greenstones, he finds out that his goods have been blacklisted as well, and he must once more turn to the seedy underside of the trade, using the knowledge of his father's Guild connections to find a less reputable buyer for his wares. While dispensing of the stones, Eet's telepathic powers alert them to a pirate raid that is about to take place on a Zacathan archaeological site on another world, so they rush off to try to warn the Zacathans, but arrive a bit too late for all except one survivor of the raid.

The thieves made off with several valuable Forerunner artifacts, including a bowl which is actually a star map containing clues to the location of the source of the zero stones and their unimaginable powers. Murdoc, Eet, Rizk and Zilwrich (the Zacathan) rush off in pursuit of the pirates and, quite improbably, are able to infiltrate Waystar and steal back the star map, so they can track down the zero stone home world.

The ending of the book contains a surprising twist, but the most surprising thing of all is that Eet and Murdoc never showed up again with further adventures. Norton must have decided to move on to newer things, though the interstellar cultures she uses as background here show up in many of her other novels.

The Zero Stone by Andre Norton

I'm fairly certain that everything that possibly could be said about this book has already been said at one point in time or another, since it was written by one of the early lights of SF back in the sixties. I loved Norton's works when I was just beginning to read SF, and this book and its sequel were two of my favorites, and when I was looking for a quick light read the other night, I knew rereading them would be a treat.

So, what can I say except that The Zero Stone has it all. There are espers and mutants and alien races both current and ancient, with civilizations living and fallen. There is murder and betrayal and a birthright usurped, with thieves guilds and free traders and the Space Patrol thrown in. Blackouts at blastoff and crashes with castaways. No sex and drugs and rock and roll, but young adult novels back in those days were pretty tame, so we can't fault Norton for that.

Murdoc Jern is an apprentice to a master gem trader as the story begins. His father, whose past was somewhat shady, arranged this training for him so that he could take over the family pawn shop some day, perhaps. When an offplanet death cult selects his master for their sacrifice, he flees for his life, and after seeking sanctuary in the temple of another god, he manages to buy passage for himself offworld with a ship of Free Traders. He apparently contracts a virulent plague and is quarantined, but the traders decide to space him, instead of putting him off ship somewhere isolated, so he flees with an unlikely ally, a mutant named Eet.

After being marooned on a jungle  planet where their commandeered landing boat crashes, they encounter primitive and hungry aliens, whom they manage to evade. Then they are chased and captured by the Guild, who believe that Murdoc posseses (and indeed he does) an artifact made by the Forerunners which is the key to great power for those who unlock its secrets. Then a space patrolman lands to investigate Guild activities in the area, and is captured as well. Eet and Murdoc find a way to escape, and take the patrolman along, too.

All the way, just great out of the frying pan into the fire action. Not deep, not philosophical, just fun.