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Ursula K. Le Guin

@ursulakleguin.com

30K followers 70 following 370 posts

Official account for the celebrated author of novels, short stories, poetry, children’s books and essays. https://www.ursulakleguin.com/

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · Jun 18

We're thrilled to present the shortlist for the 2025 Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction:

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Reposted by Ursula K. Le Guin

Library of America @libraryofamerica.bsky.social · 19h

A clowder of advance readers got their paws on @ursulakleguin.com’s Book of Cats (yes, sitting on top of a book counts as reading for these little guys). Explore this full-color album of cat-centric poems, cartoons, and prose pieces, in bookstores today. loa.org/books/ursula-k-le-guins-book-of-cats/

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 17h

Searoad audiobook (available 10/14):

RBmedia | Searoad

Listen to the audiobook Searoad, written by Ursula K. Le Guin, narrated by Alyssa Bresnahan;John Skelley.

rbmediaglobal.com

Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 17h

Searoad:

Searoad: Chronicles of Klatsand (paperback) - Library of America

Le Guin's story cycle about an Oregon coast community. Includes the award-winning “Bill Weisler,” "Quoits," the novella "Hernes," nine other stories

www.loa.org

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 17h

Book of Cats:

Ursula K. Le Guin’s Book of Cats - Library of America

A full-color album bringing together Ursula K. Le Guin’s poems, cartoons, drawings, and prose pieces about the nearly two dozen cats who shared her life.

www.loa.org

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 17h

🎉 Happy pub day to both Book of Cats and the newly reissued Searoad!

We will work on obtaining photo evidence of Pard with his latest bookish appearance, but in the meantime here are Bat (who matches the book) and Ziti (who is more curious about it).

A black cat curled up against a taupe sheet sniffs suspiciously at Ursula K. Le Guin's Book of Cats

A long-haired gray cat, stretched along the back of a blanket-covered blue sofa, sniffs curiously at Ursula K. Le Guin's Book of Cats

A copy of the new edition of Searoad, which has a cover detailed with stylized streaks of blue that turn into mountains and waves below the title, rests crookedly (oops) on a blue plush background.

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 1d

The next newsletter, on October 21st, will bring with it news of the winner of this year's Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction!

If you'd like to sign up, you can do so at ursulakleguin.com

Ursula K. Le Guin - Author

Ursula K. Le Guin was author of 21 novels, 11 volumes of short stories, 4 collections of essays, 12 children’s books, six volumes of poetry and 4 of translation.

ursulakleguin.com

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 1d

Something new from this corner of the internet: a newsletter! It will be irregular, not too frequent, and full of Ursula-related news. The first one, which went out last week, contains a note from Theo Downes-Le Guin, explaining a bit of the why and the wherefore. Here's part of that note.

A Welcome from Theo Downes-Le Guin
One of the great pleasures of my work as literary executor is the sense that we are creating a community around my mother’s writing and ideas. If I’m honest with myself, however, I know that this community already exists. Any time two people read the same book, and that book resonates with them, the potentiality for a community exists, and the chance that destiny will throw those two readers together increases exponentially. This is why text is a great tool for subversion, resistance, and revolution. So at best, I am slightly hastening this coming-together.

Ursula’s dear friend, moral compass, and tech mentor Vonda McIntyre had the foresight to set up early accounts for Ursula on Twitter and Facebook, to discourage impostors. We didn’t do anything with the accounts until after 2018, because Ursula had no interest in the style of communication that socials demand. After she died, things changed. As part of my grieving, I wanted to talk and write more about her, to as many people as possible. (I also learned, over the time, that this is my job description as executor.) Instagram, because it is image-based, allowed me to share glimpses of her life without crossing the line of privacy and intimacy.

Over the years, and with the deft guidance of my colleague Molly Templeton, we have created a tone (and a respectable following) on social media that my mother would have tolerated, if not embraced. I am certain that if she had ever jumped on Twitter (now, for us, Bluesky), she would have treated it as she treated her blog—a one-way channel that idiosyncratically alternated between intimate musings and fiery analysis of the political and ethical failings of society. I miss those tweets that never were. But it is not my job to try to simulate them—I’m not her, we have what she wrote, and we are fortunate for that.

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 5d

Vajra Chandrasekera (@vajra.me) introduces his second novel, Rakesfall, which is is shortlisted for the 2025 Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction.

For more about this year's shortlist: www.ursulakleguin.com/prize25

Vajra Chandrasekera reads from Rakesfall

YouTube video by Ursula K. Le Guin Foundation

www.youtube.com

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 6d

Hey, we know this one.

A photos of a question from Jeopardy reads "Ursula K. Le Guin's 'Lavinia' retells the story of this work by Virgil, but from the wife's point of view."

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 7d

Ursula wrote in the introduction to this 1978 edition of Planet of Exile, “Once I was asked what I thought the central, constant theme of my work was, and I said spontaneously, ‘Marriage.’"

Cover art by Dan Sneberger, published by Harper & Row.

The 1978 Harper & Row edition of Planet of Exile has art by Dan Sneberger; it shows a hand rising out of a snowy landscape, grasping a long narrow rocket. The sky beyond the mountains in the background is a rich orange shading into blue near the top.

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 7d

Coming (very) soon: An occasional newsletter about all things Ursula! Sign up here: www.ursulakleguin.com

Ursula K. Le Guin - Author

Ursula K. Le Guin was author of 21 novels, 11 volumes of short stories, 4 collections of essays, 12 children’s books, six volumes of poetry and 4 of translation.

www.ursulakleguin.com

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 12d

For more on this year's prize:

Ursula K. Le Guin — 2025 Prize for Fiction

www.ursulakleguin.com

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 12d

🌟 Shortlisted for the 2025 Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction 🌟 Nghi Vo’s latest novel, The City in Glass, is a story about deeply understanding and loving a place, and about the difficult, necessary, meaningful work required to rebuild when one’s world is irrevocably broken.

A copy of The City in Glass by Nghi Vo sits on a black shelf next to a small vase holding four brightly colored flowers. One of them is an orange very close to the orange of the flames on the book cover, which depicts an archway with two statues, behind which a city is in flames.

“She had been given nothing. She had taken it, and it was hers to neglect and destroy if she so chose. Her family had learned that much from watching the humans that swarmed the world, that love could be a destructive thing. The angels understood love as destruction. She had chosen a different way to love Azril, and this destruction had nothing to do with her.” from The City in Glass by Nghi Vo

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 13d

"Autumn" is the first part of "Six Quatrains," which appears in So Far So Good (Copper Canyon Press, 2018).

Ursula K. Le Guin's poetry collection So Far So Good: Final Poems 2014-2018, the cover of which shows a river in the foreground, with golden, rugged hills in the background.

AUTUMN

gold of amber
red of ember
brown of umber
all September

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 15d

Coming in May 2026: A new edition of The Dispossessed! This one is part of HarperCollins' new American Classics line, all of which have nifty graphic covers.

www.harpercollins.com/products/the...

The cover of HarperCollins' American Classics edition of The Dispossessed is primarily purple, with a text box in the middle containing the title and author's name - and the details "fiction" and "published 1974." A black circle, moon or planet, rises over the top of the box; a purple circle (also moon or planet) rises at the bottom, so that it slightly overlaps the design. The circles represent Anarres and Urras.

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Reposted by Ursula K. Le Guin

Ralahine Centre for Utopian Studies @ralahinecentre.bsky.social · 15d

Celebrating 40 years of Music and Poetry of the Kesh by Ursula K. Le Guin and Todd Barton. 4pm this Wednesday afternoon at the IWA in UL. Tower Seminar organized by Dr Aileen Dillane.

www.ul.ie/irish-world-...

Tower Seminar: Celebrating 40 years of Music and Poetry of the Kesh by Ursula K. Le Guin and Todd Barton

Venue: Theatre 2Time: 4pm-5.30pmPresenter: Todd Barton and Dr Aileen Dillane Chair: Dr Aileen DillaneSeptember 2025 marks the fortieth anniversary of the release of the recording 'Music and Poetry of ...

www.ul.ie

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 18d

Thank you for sharing this!

Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 18d

Thank you for sharing this!

Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 18d

Because it is always a little funny to post in first person here: The "us" in this sentence is Theo Downes-Le Guin, Ursula's son and literary executor, and @mollytempleton.com (hi, it's me, I'm typing this) who works with Theo on many projects, including the prize and the UKL social media presence.

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 18d

Are you doing a neat Ursula-related project? Talking about her work on a podcast, or reviewing the prize shortlist, or anything else? We'd love to hear about it, if so! You can always tag us here, and every email that comes through the contact form is read by an actual person.

Ursula K. Le Guin — Contact form

www.ursulakleguin.com

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 19d

Jared Pechaček (@vandroidhelsing.bsky.social) introduces and reads from his debut novel The West Passage, which is shortlisted for the 2025 Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction.

For more about this year's shortlist: www.ursulakleguin.com/prize25

Jared Pechacek reads from The West Passage

YouTube video by Ursula K. Le Guin Foundation

www.youtube.com

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 20d

She did covers for the first three books (before Tehanu was published)

Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 20d

These covers are incorrectly credited to Yvonne Gilbert in some of the books; she illustrated an earlier set of paperbacks. Here's Wizard with her cover art.

The cover of A Wizard of Earthsea with art by Yvonne Gilbert, which shows a young man, dressed in layers of capes, in a small boat. He holds a staff and has one arm outstretched toward a glowing light.

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 20d

Early ‘90s Earthsea paperbacks, art by John Jude Palencar.

The four books of Earthsea, clockwise from upper left: The Wizard of Earthsea has a purple background, with an inset painting showing a small figure in front of a city with one looming tower. The Tombs of Atuan has a blue background, and the inset painting shows a set of underground stairs, with a figure with a staff at the top, and another smaller figure, partly seen, in the foreground. The Farthest Shore has an orange background, and the inset painting shows a large dragon on a small rocky island, with a small boat at the shore. Tehanu has a slightly shiny deep red background, and the inset painting shows a dragon hovering over the sea in front of a woman standing on a rocky cliffside. On all the covers, the title and author's name take up as much space as the inset paintings.

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 21d

You'll find more details about each exhibition and book at the links above—and of course we'll be posting more about each as the opening days draw near!