I read and reviewed the two books making up this collection separately, so this is basically just for my own records. The collection rating is an average of the individual ratings. I gave Tales From Earthsea five stars, because it was just amazingly good. Le Guin's prose there was so smooth, and so very polished, without a single wasted word. (She's really a marvel of economy compared to a lot of fantasy writers!) Then, too, that short story collection was very much themed about exploring the intersection of magic and gender, which is something that appeals tremendously to me. The Other Wind wasn't quite as good in my opinion, and I gave it four stars. As much as I love Le Guin's prose, the stripped-back nature of it can sometimes dampen my emotional response: the wall and the liberation of the dead didn't quite hit me as hard as it could have. Then again, no-one has managed that particular story element like Philip Pullman, so The Other Wind suffers just a little by comparison.