In a decade and a half, since Ursula K. LeGuin's first novel appeared as one half of an Ace Double paperback, she has become one of the most important writers in the field of science fiction. Le Guin writes the sort of stories science-fiction critics have been saying ought to come out of the genre: speculative, richly inventive, stylistically rewarding fiction, effectively combining current ideas with unchanging human concerns. But in order to understand Le Guin's brand of science fiction, one must realize that, as her brother Karl Kroeber points out, she is not really a science-fiction writer: the label does not convey the range of her writing nor indicate her primary literary sources. According to Kroeber, she is a fantasist, a teller of marvelous tales. Her goal in writing is to show us ourselves and our lives at a distance, the better to create orderly patterns out...