Consider a planet floating against the blackness of space. A planet with oceans and many islands all covered in luxurious foliage. A planet with only a mild tropical climate. Allow the eye to zoom in, through the clouds to a small clearing in the verdant foliage. Here lying in a hammock is an old man, one Cerne Obrien who has just been struck by a sudden realisation that he is dying.
Once long ago Obrien was a freelance prospector who made a lucky strike and on his way to cash in had a malfunction with his ship. It crashed on this planet where he found a group of humans who had also been stranded from a colony ship that had also crashed. This planet was off the main space lanes so no rescue was ever undertaken because nobody ever knew the fate of these missing peoples. They have been living here for a great many years and have adapted to the planet.
Visually this world is a paradise. Spectacular scenery; wide, sweeping sandy beaches, lush jungle but there is a serpent in this paradise. This world wasn't designed for humans, even the gorgeous flowers will wilt at a humans touch. This world has very little that humans can eat. Only one sea monster, which is loaded with toxins and has to be laboriously prepared for over a day and a night, is their major source of food. Once prepared though it is a spectacular taste. The natives have no concept of storing foods as they live on the knife edge of starvation all the time. Conversely there is nothing on this planet that wants to eat humans either. Native predators leave them strictly alone. But there are poisoned thorns and deadly bacteria waiting for the incautious. It's still very easy to die here with a 100% mortality rate for certain illnesses.Obrien, who is referred to with respect as The Langri, wants to save this world. He has lived and seen five generations grow to maturity. He has descendants a plenty. He can foresee a time when other men will come. Men with strange weapons. Men with buildings that would stretch high into the air. Men who would swim in the sea and introduce strange poisons. Men who would take and force the natives into the mountains where there was no food for them.
So he had prepared The Plan. Once he was prepared to undertake the defence of the planet but can no longer do so. Now the brightest and best of the younger generation are to be laboriously tutored in all manner of subjects so that they will be able to face the inevitable day when somebody will try and take their world away. One to learn law, one mathematics etc. They also learn the galactic language as well as their own. These are very intelligent people.
The main humans are two sets of couples, one from the world and one newly arrived. Opposing them is the developer. The natives are Forni, a great etc grandson of the Langri and Della a young woman he loves and who loves him. They were to have been a married couple when the crisis came. They have put off their developing relationship until this situation has been sorted out.
Dealing with The Plan does put a strain on their relationship at first. Forni is the leader of the natives’ council who are following The Plan.He is unfailingly courteous and polite to everybody, even when he may not exactly understand why things are happening.
The friendly humans are Aric Hort an anthropologist hired to study the natives and Talitha Warr, the niece of H Harlow Wembling, a medical technician. (basically a computer operator with little actual hands on work) The natives do not wish to be studied far preferring to just get on with their lives and, when necessary, meditating in the sunlight, but they are prepared to put up with these humans as they change their attitudes and work with The Plan. .
At first that do not get along. Their attitudes appear to grate on each other but eventually they do realise that love is developing between them.
H Harlow Wembling is a man of vast wealth and used to getting what he wants. Firstly he sees this world as a stepping stone to greater political power and wealth. He is a venal man rather than an evil man. A ruthless man who already has a vast fortune but like so many wants more. When thwarted he engages in some very underhanded business tactics and legal chicanery. He is prepared to make what he thinks is a good offer of a10% share of the profits of any development to the natives, who already have 100% of what they already have and wish to keep unaltered, but is equally prepared to take what he wants and give nothing. The dangers of unbridled lust for profit are amply illustrated in this novel. We are presented with a paradise world, totally unspoiled and it is proposed to install large hotel and amusement complexes for the rich and not so rich to amuse themselves. Such developments would inevitably destroy the very beauty that people were
supposed to come to admire.We may not all accept Darwin and evolution but it would appear that a population of any animals left in isolation from the bulk of the population will start to develop into a different species. To my knowledge few authors have ever applied that to humans. Here the people have had to adapt to a world so much so that they are unable to eat normal human foods. They are evolving into a separate species. Many science fiction stories have humanity spread over a galaxy on many different sorts of worlds, oceans, deserts, heavy gravity, toxic minerals etc. Some stories have the populations separated by wars and other disasters but they all remain basic humans, all able to eat the same foods and inter breed. This author has a different viewpoint. One that has never been followed up in any great extent in other stories.
This world is a Polynesian type of paradise. Happy smiling natives leading slow idyllic lives. An unspoiled world with no industry or even agriculture because there is so little that they can actually eat and get any nourishment from. On such a world birth would have to be few and the population would be small. Death would be ever present and survival never guaranteed.
The arrival of other humans, one of whom sees the potential of developing a resort, will have drastic effects on the native way of life. We say we enjoy unspoilt natural things but to view them we want all our home comforts, or a golf course. Such development will inevitably lead to destruction of native life and lifestyles. We can easily destroy that we claim to treasure.
Like many other books by this author this was first written as a short story in 1961 and later largely revised into this novel form by 1974. By modern standards this is a slim work. What it may lack in character development it more than makes up for in a plot driven story that gets on with the action right away. Just enough detail is supplied about the characters for us to form an impression of either like or dislike.
Our author is not suggesting that we should all act like the supposed Noble Savage or that their life style is far superior to our own. He may well be giving a warning over unbridled lust and the way that man can damage his environment. We should recall that this work was written before any such environmental concerns were matters for large scale public consumption.
Like other works by this author technology has only a minor part to play. There are hints of a rather advanced technology but never any details. Aesthetics play a bigger part with this author. He may not be extolling music or art here but perhaps he is extolling a simpler, more caring lifestyle.
This is a good paced book that is very easy to read. The story rattles along and it is not a matter of suspending disbelief. The characters are quite believable. The basic premise in the story may not now be new. The idea of destructive big business is no longer strange. Seeing it applied to a resort development was new though. Though the subject matter of the story is serious, there are never the less many moments of pure humour in the narrative. You will have to read it to find them though. I may have given away too much already.
Should you wish to get a copy I would be very surprised if any still existed in main stream booksellers. Specialist sellers may have a copy, probably in the used category. However on line sellers like Amazon do list the work for £8.99 new paperback.
You may wish to get a used copy cheaper and several are listed both hard and paperback with prices from £1.69 hardcover and £0.01 paperback.
This edition was published by Wildside press in 1999 and has 192 pages.
This story was written in 1974 before Eco Tourism had even been thought about.
At one time this was to be made into a film, but unfortunately this never materialised.
Afterword.
I do not usually comment on the cover art of any books but I do feel that the cover of the New English Library paperback editions of 1974 and 1980 are rather poignant. I believe they were painted by British artist Tim White.
Paradise, with extra serpents. 
well written