"I was alone, with a stranger, inside the walls of a dark palace, in a strange snow-changed city, in the heart of the Ice Age of an alien world."  Ursula Legin from 'The Left Hand of Darkness'.

This is probably my third reading of this small wonderful novel but it's the first reading that I now make in context with the other novels that make up the "Hanish Cycle".  It still remains my favorite of the bunch though now 'Planet of Illusions' is a close second.