Gifts

"Gifts" is a young adult novel by famed sci-fi and fantasy author Ursula K. LeGuin. It's the first in a loose trilogy of books called "The Annals of the Western Shore,' and if the next two are as good as this one was, I look forward to reading them.
"Gifts" takes place in the Uplands, a northern country divided into the holdings of various families. Each family has its own unique gift, everything from the ability to call fire to reading minds to causing crops to wither. The most powerful practitioner of the family is called the brantor and is considered the head of the family. The gift of the family of main character Orrec is known as "the undoing", and it consists of the ability to destroy anything the user can see and point at. Unfortunately, Orrec cannot seem to control his gift, which doesn't work when he wants it to and seems to become imcredibly destructive when he uses it involuntarily. So Orrec binds his eyes so he cannot hurt anyone.
There isn't much of a plot to "Gifts," but that's alright as it allows it to focus more on its characters: Orrec, who is disturbed and uncomfortable with his family's gift; Orrec's father Canoc, a deeply flawed but very sympathetic man; Orrec's mother Melle, a Lowlander unaccustomed to uplander ways; Gry, Orrec's childhood friend who is uncomfortable with how her gift to commune with animals is usually used to help with hunting; Ogge Drum, a dangerous brantor looking to expand his family's territory; and Emmon, a rascal from the Lowlands who inspires Orrec and Gry to look beyond their limited lives. All of these characters are complicated and three dimoensional, and all of them fit very well in the world LeGuin creates for her characters. Sometimes they work at cross purposes to one another, and their behavior always seems to fit their character and the situation at hand. Especially of interest are how Orrec's wild gift means wildly different things for him, his father. and his mother; and the subtle (but rather sweet) love story that happens over the course of the book between Orrec and Gry.

The Uplands is a wonderful location. In an early chapter we are told about the various families, their brantors and their gifts, and it all seems credible: the society described sounds very much like one that would have to exist under the circumstances. I also liked how LeGuin pulls very few punches with how hard it is living there: this is a distinctly low-tech place, with the economy based on sheep- and cow-herding, members of families with powers living little better than the serfs who serve under them, and approximately three people in the entirety of the place who can actually read. Too often in traditional fantasy, people seem to be living 20th or 21st century lives with a thin coat of medieval flavor on the outside, but not here.

The lack of a plot is the only real problem. Except for the struggle between Canoc and Ogge and Orrec's own insecurity regarding his gift, most of the rest of it is giving us backstory rather than plot. As I said, this works out nicely (we get to see Orrec grow up from a baby to a teenager in the book), but at the end of it I wasn't quite sure what the point had all been.

But LeGuin is a wonderful writer, and I highly recommend this book. Check it out if you can.