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Dec 07, 2016ben_zen rated this title 5 out of 5 stars
Science Fiction is the domain of "what if", and this book lands squarely in that domain. Le Guin asks, what if there were humans who were perfect hermaphrodites and asexual most of the time? What if they built a society around that structure? What if gender did not define actions or roles? When The Left Hand of Darkness was released in 1969, those ideas were still fringe, to an extent, and even today continue to be viewed with apprehension in some quarters. This story sets a background of interstellar travel, to create an altered image of humanity, and ultimately reflect on our local interactions.