Disappointing. For a novel that won both the Hugo and the Nebula, The Left Hand of Darkness is remarkably dull. It suffers from madeupworditis, a disease that afflicts many fantasy and science fiction writers, exhibited by prose littered with invented words that serve little more than to make the setting seem a bit more exotic. There are examples where the technique serves the novel (c.f., Riddley Walker — minus the unneeded glossary — for a terrificly successful example of this gambit), but this is not one of them.

There are some saving graces. The psychological aspects of the Envoy's journey are somewhat interesting, and perhaps the division of Winter's society into two dissimilar governments is an interesting juxtaposition against the lack of gender differences in their inhabitants. And perhaps there are layers of deeper meaning that I'm too dumb to see.

What I can say for certain is that I plodded through this novel, and I have no desire to ever read another one like it.