The Left Hand of Darkness is a work of novel by Ursula K. Le Guin, first published in 1969. The story follows Genly Ai who is an envoy of a confederation of many planets called Ekumen. He is on a mission to convince the rulers of an icy planet called Gethen to join their confederation. There, he met Therem Harth rem ir Estraven, the prime minister of Karhide. Even though Gethenian looks a lot like Terran, Genly Ai learned that they're ambisexual. The cultural and political values that were unique to Gethenian because of this trait cause Genly a lot of difficulty in understanding Gethen. But with time and through his love-hate relationship with his companion, Estraven, Genly Ai learned the beauty of his host planet and the people that live on it.

For starters, the label science-fiction that is used to describe this book on the internet is frankly quite misleading. I was expecting some hardcore science-fiction, like 2001: A Space Odyssey or Dune, but this book just doesn't have the same focus and intentions as those books. Not to say that it's bad, but it's certainly is different, and unfortunately not to my taste.

There are a lot of amazing ideas that this book offers, like the idea of growing society in an androgynous world and the practice of Gethenian fortune-telling, but all of them were either only mentioned once and never brought up again or just used as a prelude to some moral messages that the author was trying to convey. Ignoring the importance or curiosity of the author's messages, they feel a bit random and out of place sometimes.

Also, I think this book leans more to its romance and drama than its science-fiction elements. I think a lot of people will like that, but unfortunately, I'm not one of them. I found the book quite boring during the near-climax of the book. But, you know, maybe you like a lot of drama and love story in your science-fiction.