paizo.com - The Anubis Murders (Trade Paperback)

About the Author

In 1974, Gary Gygax (1938–2008) co-created the Dungeons & Dragons roleplaying game, forever changing the face of fantasy. The hand-assembled first print run of 1000 boxed rulesets sold out in nine months, and by 1978 the game’s explosion in popularity warranted a three-volume harcover rules expansion called Advanced Dungeons & Dragons authored by Gygax. The release of AD&D coincided with the explosive popularity that catapulted the game into a true cultural phenomenon, introducing fantasy to a generation of new readers. D&D’s literary roots drew upon the sword and sorcery work of authors like Fritz Leiber, Jack Vance, and Robert E. Howard, and by the mid-1980s D&D’s publisher, TSR, began to release their own line of fantasy fiction.

Thus was born Gord the Rogue, Gygax’s rakish, metropolitan thief whose daring adventures span seven novels: Saga of Old City, Artifact of Evil, Sea of Death, City of Hawks, Night Arrant, Come Endless Darkness, and Dance of Demons. Years later he introduced a new character, the crime-solving Ægyptian wizard-priest Magister Setne Inhetep, in a trilogy of novels: The Anubis Murders, The Samarkand Solution, and Death in Delhi.

Gygax's importance to American popular culture was solidified with an animated cameo alongside Al Gore, Stephen Hawking, and Star Trek's Nichelle Nichols in a 2000 episode of Futurama.

Respectable Hobbit (Pathfinder Charter Subscriber, Pathfinder Modules Subscriber), Sat, Dec 1, 2007, 09:52 PM

Is the book set in Yarth or Aerth? The back of the book says Aerth, but in the book they say Yarth. Anyone know where to find a map of Yarth? There must have been one for the Dangerous Journeys game.

Erik Mona (Publisher), Thu, Dec 13, 2007, 12:58 PM

The issue is pretty confusing.

The book says it is set in Yarth, but at some point after the book was written the world's name was changed to Aerth for the associated Dangerous Journeys RPG products. I think it may have been to avoid conflict with the world of Gardner F. Fox's "Kothar" stories, which is also called Yarth.

But Inhetep's planet is called Yarth in the final Gord the Rogue book (Dance of Demons) as well as in the first two Setne Inhetep books. I'm not sure about Death in Delhi, yet, as I haven't read it in a while.

The back of the book should probably have said Yarth, or I should have changed the interior text to match the Aerth construction. I should ask Gary which he prefers and will go with that in future printings and editions.

Haladin, Thu, Jan 31, 2008, 02:24 PM

is this a novel or rpg adventure?

Lilith (Pathfinder Charter Superscriber, Planet Stories Subscriber), Thu, Jan 31, 2008, 02:39 PM

Novel (as are the rest of the Planet Stories stuff). Though I would not be averse to a supplement in those worlds.

Matthew Morris (Pathfinder Charter Superscriber, Planet Stories Subscriber), Fri, Feb 1, 2008, 05:05 AM

Lilith wrote:

Novel (as are the rest of the Planet Stories stuff). Though I would not be averse to a supplement in those worlds.

*pokes Lilith with Hamunaptra*