When Le Guin wrote these stories, they appeared first in numerous science fiction and literary magazines and anthologies before being collected in The Wind's Twelve Quarters. Some of these stories are strongly imaginative and fantastic, while others are more mainstream in setting. But in all the stories, Le Guin uses realism and believable settings to depict real-life issues within the realms of the fantastic.

The first of her stories to appear in print was "April in Paris" (September 1962), a time-travel story, more fantasy than science fiction, in which black magic romantically unites four lonely people from different eras.

The second was "The Masters" (February 1963), her first genuine science fiction story, set in a post-catastrophic world where science is proscribed because of the havoc it has wrought. Its heroes are two defiant adventurers brought to inquisitorial justice for secretly studying mathematics.

The third published was "Darkness Box" (November 1963), a...