"Rocannon's World (Hainish Cycle #1)" by Ursula K. Le Guin, 1966

"Rocannon's World (Hainish Cycle #1)" by Ursula K. Le Guin, 1966

Rocannon’s World begins with the short story “Semley’s Necklace”, and that’s why I picked it up to read now. “Semley’s Necklace” is a story that is science fiction and fantasy at the same time. Semley’s a beautiful princess questing for a necklace made by and stolen by the dwarves. She goes into their underground kingdom; they take her to a strange place, and she returns with the necklace to find that many years have passed, the baby she left is a grown woman, and the husband she hoped to please is dead. At the same time, she’s an alien, the dwarves are another race of aliens, the strange place is on another planet and she lost the years by travelling at lightspeed. The story gains its power because we can see all this simultaneously as true. It’s amazing and resonant.

The rest of the novel can’t maintain this double level at the same pitch. We do see Rocannon both as an alien anthropologist and as an Odin-figure, but it feels more forced. It’s also hard to like Rocannon, he’s too typical of the SF anthropologist hero, well equipped and resourceful, but too questioning of himself and the world to get away with that. 

My rating: ★★☆☆☆ (2 out of 5 stars)

NOTE: Ansible

An ansible is a fictional machine capable of instantaneous or superluminal communication. Typically it is depicted as a lunch-box-sized^{[citation needed]} object with some combination of microphone, speaker, keyboard and display. It can send and receive messages to and from a corresponding device over any distance whatsoever with no delay. Ansibles occur as plot devices in science fiction literature.

The word ansible was coined by Ursula K. Le Guin in her 1966 novel Rocannon's World.^[1] Le Guin states that she derived the name from "answerable," as the device would allow its users to receive answers to their messages in a reasonable amount of time, even over interstellar distances.^[2] Her award-winning 1974 novelThe Dispossessed,^[3] a book in the Hainish Cycle, tells of the invention of the ansible.

“City of Illusions (Hainish Cycle #3)” by Ursula K. Le Guin, 1967

“City of Illusions (Hainish Cycle #3)” by Ursula K. Le Guin, 1967

Set on Earth far into the distant future, the story is about man who is found in the middle of forest without any memories of himself; not even his name. After six (6) years of redevelopment and growth, he, now named Falk) decides to leave the tribe who cared and taught him language and their ways in search of his lost identity.

Falk encounters Estrel, who becomes his companion on his journey, and leads him to the city of Es Toch where they find members of the Shing. The Shing, an alien race, is widely regarded at the enemy and may be able to restore his memory.

The Shing is able to restore his memory as long he is willing to sacrifice his current identity, Falk, so that his previous identity can supplant his brain.

With the process of restoring his memory, he remembers his name is Ramarren and comes from a planet called Werel. He emerges as a new person with pre-Falk memories and vastly greater scientific knowledge. Falk’s personality is eventually revived and after some instability, Falk’s and Ramarren’s mind learn to coexist.

Defining and questioning the truth seems to be a central issue in this book. Additionally, themes of illusion and ambiguity are central to the novel. The story is as much a post-industrial collapse science fiction tale as it is a mystery novel.

Personally, the book got off to a decent start. The middle third of the book, which covered the “journey” was definitely draggy. I found myself speeding through. However, by two thirds of the way through the book, when Falk arrives at Es Toch, I was glued and couldn’t wait to find out what happened next.

My rating: ★★★★☆ (4 out of 5 stars) - I really liked it.