photo by Dan Tuffs
Nearly 50 years into her publishing career, Ursula K. Le Guin lives in a rare zone where she’s simultaneously iconic and contemporary. She has major literary awards dating back to 1968 and three new releases this fall that are at the forefront of indie bookstore holiday campaigns throughout the Northwest. One of those new titles is Finding My Elegy: New and Selected Poems, while the other two comprise a set of short fiction handpicked by Le Guin, The Unreal and the Real: Selected Stories. Volume 1 is Where on Earth; Volume 2 is Outer Space, Inner Lands. It’s this set that served as catalyst for two fantastic pieces that 
came our way this week. The first is a joy of rediscovery post called “No Neanderthal” by NWBL contributor James Crossley on the Island Books Message in a Bottle blog. The second comes from The Slate Book Review, a genre pigeonholing criticism piece called “No Better Spirit.”
Glad to have scooped Slate, if only by a day.
Does this woman have a lifetime achievement award from PNBA yet?
Yep, 2001. We got that one right.