Le Guin, Ursula K.
overblik
Scattered here and there, small isolated groups of humanity lived in a state of semi-barbarity. Lost were the skills and science, the knowledge that had been Earth's in the golden age of the League of Worlds.
Each time a colony of Earthmen began to stir the ashes of half-forgotten technology, the Shing, mindlying ravagers of Terra, would crush them like insects. Only one man dared to stand against the Shing's hunger for Earth conquest, and that man-the alien with the amber eyes-would first have to prove to a lie-tormented humanity that he himself was not a tool of the enemy!
Originally published in 1967 by Ace, City of Illusions is not currently in print as a stand-alone novel. It is available in the collections Worlds of Exile and Illusion and Hainish Novels and Stories, Volume One.
Though often considered the third book of the Hainish Cycle, Ursula maintained that there is no particular cycle or order for the Ekumen novels.