Tehanu and Tenar have traveled to Havnor to meet with the King and parley with dragons. Ged is left alone at Gont, and is visited by a wandering sorcerer who has terrible nightmares of the dead calling out to him. Their stories intertwine into the perfect ending for this incredible series!

There are extremely deep themes in all the Earthsea books, but they all come to a head in this last book. Death and life, meaning and identity; all these themes are analyzed and emotionally inspected through the characters and their experiences.

As with most of Le Guin's books, I'm not quite sure what to think. It's masterfully written with truly beautiful prose, and a deep story full of meaning and emotion. But it's just so strange and other-worldly and odd. The best thing about her writing is that it makes you think about things... really think and ponder.

And I love that she never explains things to the reader in a condescending way. She expects the reader to have the intelligence and imagination to fill in the little gaps between the words. It's like she gives you the first half of a well-known sentence, and your heart calls out the end of the sentence before you realize it. She lays such a subtle pathway for you to follow that you KNOW what the character is feeling, or what the character wanted to say behind the dialogue they actually said, without a lengthy explanation of the inner workings of the character. One word suffices.

I love this series!