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by svsucculents 2688 days ago
Le Guin is hard to stomach as you get older. I can read CS Lewis and Tolkien with a forgiving eye but not Lewis. Rowling is terrible. Susan Cooper should have had her success.
2 comments

I don't find Le Guin hard to stomach at 43. CS Lewis on the other hand is heavy-handed religious propaganda.

But I can understand some taking issue with Le Guin. The language of the Earthsea books in particular is intentionally simple. My 9 year old has read most of the Earthsea books, and the series was initially explicitly targeted at teenagers.

For some that's hard to look past.

Some le Guin is a little, unpolished. Some of her magazine short stories; Rocannon's World, which is vaguely set in the ecumenical universe, but flying cat horses?
I think I've reread her whole earthsea cycle about every decade since ~1996, so maybe its time for another go.

I will say, some of her magazine fiction didn't age well. Some of the shorter stories and dime novels are fun, but, well wonky and incoherent. Not that I think she was going for coherence, but it distracts from the narrative once you are bit familiar with her worlds.