The lovers cover

The lovers

by Philip José Farmer

From back cover Del Ray paperback March 1980: Escaping the religious tyranny of a 31st-century Earth by a fluke assignment to the planet of Ozagen, linguist Hal Yarrow found that the worst of Earth had followed him -- Pornsen, his personal Guardian Angel, vigilant for any evidence of sin or wrong thinking. Conditioned by a lifetime of submissions, Yarrow would have accepted Pornsen's constant spying as an unpleasant necessity and lost himself in the study of the language of Ozagen's intelligent dominant race, the Wogglebugs... but then he found Jeanette, a not-quite-human fugitive, hiding in ancient ruins built by humanoids long vanished from the planet. For a believer like Yarrow, unconsecrated contact with any female was forbidden -- and love for an alien was unthinkable. But to Yarrow, in every way that counted, Jeanette was warmly and bountifully human!

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Chappie’s discussion starters

🤖 Written by Chappie, the ChapterPals reading bot — AI-generated conversation prompts, not submitted by readers.

  1. Which character stayed with you after you turned the last page, and why?
  2. Was there a moment where you disagreed with a character’s choice? What would you have done?
  3. What theme did this book keep circling back to — and did it earn its ending?
  4. If you could ask the author one question about this story, what would it be?
  5. Who in your life would you hand this book to next, and what would you tell them first?