puppetmaker | RIP Ursula K. Le Guin

When I was young I read “A Wizard of Earthsea” and I loved it. So I did what I always did when I found a new author and tried to read everything that I could find by that author. “The Left Hand of Darkness” changed the way I perceived the world. Her work challenged me and made me question what I really did believe. She knew how to write and engage me as a reader.

I first met her when she came back to Emory, where she had been a secretary in the biology department, and did a talk. I told her how much her work had meant to me.

Fast forward a number of years and we ended up on a couple of panels together at various conventions and conferences. She made sure that everyone on the panel got to say something on the topic at hand. When she spoke we all listened very carefully.

We had a lot of friends in common and those friends are hurting today as we now have a hole in our universe that she fit in.

There are also all her fans and people she helped through her writing who are missing her.

We have lost a giant in the literary world.

I talk about the gods, I am an atheist. But I am an artist too, and therefore a liar. Distrust everything I say. I am telling the truth.- Ursula K. Le Guin

I am grateful that I did get to tell her how much her work meant to me.