science fiction

Rocannon's World - Ursula K. LeGuin Book Review

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Review Summary
Rocannon is a 43-year-old galactic ethnologist based on the colony of New South Georgia. One day a lordly female of the Angyar race (from a distant, largely unexplored planet) appears at his museum and demands the return of a golden necklace with a blue gem that is on display. The curators hand it over, and Rocannon decides to follow the mysterious but beautiful female to her home world, where at least four or five different higher life forms live in uneasy truce. It appears that an unknown invader with advanced flight and space travel technology has been wiping out settlements on this fairly primitive world so the planet can serve as a staging area for invasion of the greater League of Worlds. Rocannon forms a team with some of the locals to find and destroy the invader. Much of the novel concerns the team's exploration of mountains and water, with occasional firefights until the climactic battle. This was LeGuin's first science fiction novel (1966), and as such it is fairly short and simple, and its characters thinly developed.
David Loftus, Resident Scholar


Detailed literary breakdown of Rocannon's World
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Plot

Composition of Book
Descript. of chases or violence - 30%
planning/preparing, gather info, debate puzzles/motives - 20%
Feelings, relationships, character bio/development - 10%
Descript. of society, phenomena (tech), places - 40%




Tone of book - suspenseful (sophisticated fear)
FANTASY or SCIENCE FICTION? - science fiction story
Explore/1st contact/ enviro story Yes
Plotlets: - exploring a wondrous planet or phenomena
War or Invasion Yes
Major kinds of combat: - lasers
Is this an adult or child's book? - Adult or Young Adult Book

Main Character
Identity: - Male
Profession/status: - explorer
Age: - 40's-50's
How sensitive is this character? - sensitive to others' feelings
Sense of humor - Mostly serious with occasional humor
Intelligence - Smarter than most other characters
Physique - average physique

Main Adversary
Identity: - an organization
How much of work is main antagonist actually present in: - a little/some

Setting
Terrain - Mountains - Forests - Domed/Underground City
A substantial portion of this book takes place on a non-Earth planetary body: - inhabited by friendly aliens - unfriendly aliens - primitive aliens - empty, or nearly empty world
Planet outside solar system? Yes

Style
Person? - mostly 3rd
Accounts of torture and death? - generic/vague references to death/punishment
scientific jargon? (SF only) - some scientific explanation
How much dialogue? - little dialog
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The First Men in the Moon by H.G. Wells




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