The lead character in The Foundry is a cultural anthropologist.      The Foundry, a sci-fi fantasy, is about the protected planet of Dianis. In a sudden shift of federation policy, the planet is stripped of its observers, but a single team circumvents the withdrawal and stays behind. Love, friendship, and career aspirations drive the members of the last remaining Interspecies Development Branch team.  In many ways, The Foundry can be compared to Dune. Both are on primitive backwater worlds with precious resources coveted by the galaxy. Both are protected by a caretaker organization, and both succumb to galactic intrigue and betrayal.    In The Foundry, the lead story in the Dianis chronicles, the team seeks to overcome the distress of the IDB withdrawal while exploring ways to defend against the coming extrasolars. These efforts, however, attract the attention of the powerful Paleowrights, a major religious sect on Dianis. The Paleowrights begin to covet the technologies that the IDB’s Achelous Forushen brings to Dianis, and intervene with the goal of planet-wide domination. Achelous and his small band are thus faced with two enemies: galactic conglomerates intent on stealing resources, and the provincial Paleowrights intent on suppressing free will.   Former Chief Inspector Achelous Forushen fights back against these forces, and prepares the people of Dianis for the on-coming extrasolar onslaught. However, Achelous is torn between his oath to serve the IDB, mistrust of his own government, and devotion to his forbidden provincial lover and mother of his child, Marisa.   Unaware of the cosmic turmoil that surrounds her lover, Marisa, a trader princess and force of nature, struggles to learn Achelous's secrets as he attempts to keep her from the truth: he is not the simple Dianis trader he pretends to be, but an undercover agent for a secret monitoring organization, the IDB, from a society hundreds of years in advance of her own. Marisa loves Achelous, her son, and her country, but can she unravel the mystery of Achelous in time to save him from Paleowright retribution?   In The Foundry there are four themes that evoke powerful human interactions amongst the characters: \t-- The theory of reverse colonization \t-- The principal of ultimate cause \t-- The theory of evolutionary ceilings \t-- The struggle against moral ambiguity   Weaved amongst these themes is the key concept of providing for the defense of an indigenous people where the only solution is to empower them.   Currently, five books have been established: The Foundry (published); The Matriarch (in editing); The Citadel (outlined); The Drakan Empire (in concept); The Sizars (in concept).