Tehanu

Ursula Le Guin has long been one of my favorite authors. The Dispossessed is quite possibly my favorite science fiction novel. However, I have never been satisfied with how she wrote women. I recall being troubled by her treatment of the female characters in some books, such as The Lathe of Heaven, and puzzled by the almost complete absence of female characters in others.

In Tehanu I am finally satisfied. This is a book about women, and they are fully developed characters who are not filtered through the lens of Le Guin’s concept of the male gaze. And what excellent, complex characters they are. A very fine book.