Book Review: THE OTHER WIND (Earthsea Cycle # 6) by Ursula K. Le Guin

The Other Wind by Ursula K. Le Guin
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Sometimes a book makes you cry, uncontrollably. With a single word.

This is the first time it happened, but it came on so unexpectedly, it was like a mini geyser exploded in my eyes!!

And THAT's power. That is literary sorcery, of which Ursula Le Guin possesses PUH-LENTY.

The sixth and final novel in the Earthsea series seemed much longer than the others. If it was a movie, it would have been a "talkie," because, like in real life, the saving of souls and the afterlife is slow work. Don't worry, the action comes in the end. Talking doesn't stop the dead from crossing over, when the wall that maintains the order of the world is crumbling down.

I'll always remember this one fondly for the barest hint of an 'enemies-to-lovers' trope that somehow fed my romance-hungry soul more than the best/worst romance novels! All I can say is... Thank goodness for AO3!

I also appreciate how Le Guin writes of aging characters, of how powerful the powerless and poor actually are. There are no perfect happy endings, there is always much sacrifice, but Le Guin shows that the choice to be saved or damned lies in us, that it is important to have "many skills, the greatest of which is kindness," and that joy lies not in possessing the beloved, but in setting them free.

***

My edition had four more short stores after this sixth novel, which added more color to other new characters from the same world. Am grateful for these short blessings that put off the leavetaking for a while longer, for I am now one of those who feel Earthsea to be every bit as real as our own world.

Looking back on the edition as a whole, was it worth shelling out precious book money for? YAS QUEEN!! The text of Le Guin's lecture at the end, EARTHSEA REVISIONED, is one of the best things about this edition.

Important things for future readers to know:

Books 1-3 were written for YA audiences ('A Wizard of Earthsea,' 'The Tombs of Atuan,' and 'The Farthest Shore'), but Books 4-6 are strictly for mature audiences only ('Tehanu,' 'Tales from Earthsea,' and 'The Other Wind'). While all were incredible in their own way, TEHANU was by the far the most powerful, and also the most emotionally traumatic one to read.

Is it essential reading? Yes. I'm kicking myself for having read the series only now, so I'm spreading the gospel, as it were. It doesn't matter if you're a beginning reader, or a jaded one in the middle of a book slump. Le Guin is for everyone, and the moral weight of these stories are comparable to Tolkien's and C.S. Lewis' masterpieces, even more so because of how Le Guin portrays men and women in the later books.

Gender is a big thing in all of Le Guin's fiction. It is 2022 and while we have made steps as a society, there are still a lot of folks who need to be dragged kicking and screaming into the light. As Le Guin said, "When the world turns over, you can't go on thinking upside down. What was innocence is now irresponsibility."

She goes on to say that "A rule may be unjust, yet its servants may be just." If these books can help start a conversation going about gender roles in literature and real life, then that is plenty of good done already.

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