(Nonfiction: Shambhala, 2004)
In our postmodern age, few critics dare to express opinions as fresh and unguarded as those put across in the essays collected here. Ursula Le Guin writes against the grain, delightfully upsetting the literary cart with her direct style and her authoritative yet personal voice. She deploys wit and humor to comment on topics of gender and social justice, the power of language, and the work of her literary favorites—Tolstoy, Tolkien, Woolf, and Twain among them. She has no interest in anticipating ruffled feathers or packaging her views to make them more palatable.
