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The Birthday Of The World and Other Stories (Gollancz S.F.)
 
 
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The Birthday Of The World and Other Stories (Gollancz S.F.) (Paperback)

by Ursula Le Guin (Author)
4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)

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Product details

  • Paperback: 384 pages
  • Publisher: Gollancz; First Edition edition (16 Jan 2003)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0575074795
  • ISBN-13: 978-0575074798
  • Product Dimensions: 21.4 x 13.2 x 3.4 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 342,218 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Product Description

Product Description

'Her most important book since ALWAYS COMING HOME and her most satisfactory collection since her first, the brilliant, THE WIND'S TWELVE QUARTERS. A formidable and rewarding work, a prime candidate for best SF collection of the year. An essential book.' LOCUS Six of the eight piece are set in Le Guin's classic Hainish cycle. The title story, 'The Birthday of the World', stands alone and the final piece, 'Paradises Lost', is a new short novel original to the collection, a major addition to the generation starship subgenre of science fiction.


About the Author

Ursula K. Le Guin was born in 1929 in Berkeley, California, and lives in Portland, Oregon. She has won many Nebula and Hugo Awards as well as a National Book Award, a Pushcart Prize, the Harold D. Vursell Memorial Award of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, a Newberry Honor and the World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement.
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Customer Reviews

3 Reviews
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Average Customer Review
4.3 out of 5 stars (3 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Great Le Guin short story collection, 17 Jul 2002
By P. Jørgensen "percjorgensen" (Oslo, Norway) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
This review is from: The Birthday of the World: And Other Stories (Hardcover)
This collection of short stories by Ursula K. Le Guin shows her strength as an author and worldbuilder. Some (not all) of the stories take place on worlds of the Ekumen or Hainish universe. One of the stories is brand new, the others have been published in various magazines.

We visit worlds like Gethen, as in the novel 'The Left Hand of Darkness', where most individuals are neither female nor male, but periodically enter the state of kemmer, where they asume one or the other sexual form. Or O, where couples marry couples. On the planet Seggri women outnumber men, who are kept apart for enjoyment and recreation purposes. In the short story 'Solitude' we visit a planet where there is no society as such, just loose bonds and encounters.

Of course, such short summaries can't get across the detail of Le Guin's work. And it is precisely the social anthropology and the details that make the stories and the worlds very much alive - and make you think. For the stories are not only thought-provoking, they might even be plain provoking, and may make you think again on several subjects.

So for a collection of science fiction in which there is more social science than physics or chemistry, 'The Birthday of the World: and other stories' is a very fine choice.

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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Very strong set of stories, 9 Nov 2003
By G. Rogers "Gid" - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
This is a set of speculations about possible societies, distinguished by having different conventions for sexual and gender relations. With this subject there is danger of an author using characters as too-obvious puppets, but no ax-grinding here, all the stories are personal narratives, with a wide variation in viewpoint and tone, and more to the point very well written, readable, and interesting. Good speculative fiction. All within a faint background of LeGuins Hainish/Ekumen novels. I had thought it would be a late-career roundup or ragbag of stories, but it's much more of a integrated themed work, and a bit of a tour de force.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Very strong set of stories, 9 Nov 2003
By G. Rogers "Gid" - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
This as a set of speculations about possible societies, distinguished by having different conventions for sexual and gender relations. With this subject there is danger of an author using characters as too-obvious puppets, but no ax-grinding here, all the stories are personal narratives, with a wide variation in viewpoint and tone, and more to the point very well written, readable, and interesting. Good speculative fiction. All within a faint background of LeGuins Hainish/Ekumen novels. I had thought it would be a late-career roundup or ragbag of stories, but it's much more of a integrated themed work, and a bit of a tour de force.
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