The Steel Of Raithskar The Gandalara Cycle Vol 1 By Randall Garrett

The Steel of Raithskar is the first novel in the classic seven-book science fiction and fantasy series The Gandalara Cycle, co-written by Randall Garrett and his wife Vicki Ann Heydron. First published as a mass-market paperback by Bantam Books in 1981, this sword-and-planet adventure blend follows a terminally ill language professor who is suddenly transported into a strange new world.

The story follows Ricardo Carillo, a dying language professor who witnesses a giant fireball while on a cruise ship. Instead of dying, he awakens in a healthy, youthful body in the middle of an exotic desert world known as Gandalara.