Rocannon's World

Science fiction with a high fantasy aesthetic: Rocannon's World is populated by alien races who are deliberate elf, dwarf, etc. analogues, and the writing style is rather Tolkienesque. In most authors' hands, this would be dire. Le Guin pulls it off fairly believably, but so much of the (short) book is spent explaining and justifying how these alien races could have evolved in this particular manner that the plot gets a bit lost in the shuffle. There are a few purely awesome scenes scattered throughout the book, but overall it just feels tired and boring. Definitely not Le Guin's best work.