Originally published as "Dowry of the Angyar" and later as the prologue of Rocannon’s World, Semley's necklace follows the events of import in the everyday life of Semley, an amazingly beautiful but primitive noble on a small world with three separate sentient races. Semley's world is one surrounded by myths, legends, knights, and castles, battles, and honor, and chivalry—until the Starlords come. The Starlords, actually humans, make contact by exacting a heavy tax upon all races they encounter in order to fight a grim war at the end of all time. Semley knows none of this however, and she is bitter that her once noble house has fallen into poverty due to the constant offerings of tribute to the Starlords. Then she learns that an ancient heirloom of unsurpassed beauty is in the realm of the enigmatic Gdemiar, the only race to have the slightest meaningful contact with the Starlords. She resolves to reclaim her lost birthright, and her journey will affect her in ways that no one of her race will understand, and exact a price perhaps better left unpaid.
Author
Ursula K. Le Guin published twenty-two novels, eleven volumes of short stories, four collections of essays, twelve books for children, six volumes of poetry and four of translation, and has received many awards: Hugo, Nebula, National Book Award, PEN-Malamud, etc. Her recent publications include the novel Lavinia, an essay collection, Cheek by Jowl, and The Wild Girls. She lived in Portland, Oregon. She was known for her treatment of gender (The Left Hand of Darkness, The Matter of Seggri), political systems (The Telling, The Dispossessed) and difference/otherness in any other form. Her interest in non-Western philosophies was reflected in works such as "Solitude" and The Telling but even more interesting are her imagined societies, often mixing traits extracted from her profound knowledge of anthropology acquired from growing up with her father, the famous anthropologist, Alfred Kroeber. The Hainish Cycle reflects the anthropologist's experience of immersing themselves in new strange cultures since most of their main characters and narrators (Le Guin favoured the first-person narration) are envoys from a humanitarian organization, the Ekumen, sent to investigate or ally themselves with the people of a different world and learn their ways.
