Genly Ai is an ethnologist observing the people of the planet Gethen, a world perpetually in winter. The people there are androgynous, normally neuter, but they can become male or female at the peak of their sexual cycle.
He is drawn into the complex politics of the planet and, during a long, tortuous journey across the ice he loses his professional detachment and reaches a painful understanding of the true nature of Gethenians and even finds love…
