A review by 5aru
Earthsea: The First Four Books by Ursula K. Le Guin

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

I actually attempted to get into this saga a few years ago, but I am certain it wasn't the right time, because I dropped the first book back then — and now, I breezed through all four of them. I loved them, though I confess I don't love them all equally; Tehanu is my heart's chosen, and it shines best of them all. Le Guin's fantasy is often compared to Tolkien's, but it is far more introspective than his, in my opinion. Le Guin questions the precepts that her very fantasy is constructed upon, and where Tolkien appreciated domesticity and ordinariness with the nostalgia one feels during a long absence from home, Le Guin focuses on it. Her fantasy is the daily and the domestic, especially in Tehanu; it is women's work, a woman's emotions, a woman's feelings. I haven't found such introspection in any other epic fantasy, precisely because — by definition — an epic is a quest, a journey. Perhaps that's why The Farthest Shore seemed the weakest of the four, to me, because it is the closest to the hero's journey.
 
Yet Le Guin's love for the craft and the language is evident in all she writes, and it shows beautifully in all four novels. I would call it indispensable, essential, except no book is that — a book for every reader, and all. But knowing what I now know, I'd be deeply sorry if I hadn't read them.
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