Hey Jared,
Good to hear you’re alive. I really want to hear your opinions on the Stormlight Archive before I start my read through. In the mean time I’m continuing my Bookshelf Blitz.
Title: A Wizard of Earthsea
Series: Earthsea; Book 1
Author: Ursula Le Guin
Genre: Fantasy
Audience: YA
ROTS Setting: UU, Medieval, High Magic, Dragons
Synopsis:Â Ged, the greatest sorcerer in all Earthsea, was called Sparrowhawk in his reckless youth. Hungry for power and knowledge, Sparrowhawk tampered with long-held secrets and loosed a terrible shadow upon the world. This is the tale of his testing, how he mastered the mighty words of power, tamed an ancient dragon, and crossed death’s threshold to restore the balance.
Recommendation: This book is recommended. Suitable for teens.
I didn’t overly enjoy this book. It wasn’t awful or anything, it just didn’t capture me. The prose is probably the most notable reason for my experience. There is a grand historic feel to the book which when combined with a focus on events over the characters experience it sort of feels like a detailed history textbook. That’s not my preference, thus my lack of enjoyment, but it wasn’t unreadable or tedious. The short length helped keep the pace up and the details there were felt natural to the story being told. Not too much exposition, not too little.
Ged/Sparrowhawk was a decent character and I was able to follow much of his growth. I think having seen the miniseries helped keep him real even if they had slightly different experiences.
The plot had a good amount of foreshadowing which let somethings not be explicitly stated. It streamlined the experience without sacrificing depth.
In summary, I think it’s well written even if it wasn’t my personal taste. My personal rating would be 3/5 but more objectively it’s probably 4/5, at least. I also won’t be continuing the series.
Robert
Reading Over The Shoulder 
Wasn’t Earthsea also one of those terrible scifi channel miniseries.
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It wasn’t that bad……but yes.
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Here goes another of the “classics” I still have not come around to reading… And now I wonder how I might react to it, in light of your comments. Only time will tell! 🙂
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I am “liking” this because you took the effort to write this, but not liking that you didn’t find this to be the finest piece of middle grade literature you’ve ever read. Fie, sir, FIE!
Background really plays a big part, doesn’t it? I read a part of this, in a fantasy collection, when I was like 9 or 10. Read the whole book when 11 or 12 and it has stuck with me ever since. There are times I wonder what I’d think of it if I read it for the first time now. I have a feeling I’d be much more inline with what you experienced.
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It’s because I knew you liked it that I wanted to give it a fair shot.
I also think it’s not just our maturity but the time we were in back then. The books we get now are very different from this book.
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Thanks for trying 😀
And isn’t that the truth? I wonder if a book like this would even make it in today’s world?
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