The first volume of collected short stories by multiple award-winner Ursula K. Le Guin, selected by the author herself.'Le Guin's storytelling is sharp, magisterial, funny, thought-provoking and exciting, exhibiting all that science fiction can be' EMPIRE

A century from now people will still be reading the fantasy stories of Ursula K. Le Guin with joy and wonder. Five centuries from now they might ask if their author ever really existed, or if Le Guin was an identity made from the work of many writers rolled into one. A millennium on and her stories will be so familiar, like myths and fairytales today, that only dedicated scholars will ask who wrote them. Such is the fate of the truly great writers, whose stories far outlive their names - GUARDIANI read her non-stop growing up and read her still. What makes her so extraordinary for me is that her commitment to the consequences of our actions, of our all too human frailties, is unflinching and almost without precedent for a writer of such human optimism. She never turns away from how flinty the heart of the world is. It gives her speculations a resonance, a gravity that few writers, mainstream or generic, can matchThe first of a two-volume collection focuses on stories that are occasionally tinged with magic but remain primarily realistic ... This volume shows that SFWA Grand Master Le Guin can make as great a mark outside genre fiction as she did within it - PUBLISHERS WEEKLY