Rating: 
Summary: Once again Ursula surpasses herself
Review: If you loved the Earthsea trilogy, and you loved Tehanu even though you hate sequels, especially sequels to trilogies, you will once again be amazed, delighted, and moved by The Other Wind.
Rating: 
Summary: A good beginning, but predictable ending.
Review: I love the entire series, and was so surpised to see this addition. Le Guin spends a lot of time building the context of the story plot only to leave the ending a predicatble, almost boring ending. It's worth reading, but I'd wait for paperback.
Rating: 
Summary: Fitting closure to the Earthsea Cycle
Review: Let me get this out of the way first: the original Earthsea Trilogy is one LeGuin's great achievements, entirely on par with her best books for "mature" readers from throughout her long career.
However, I was extremely disappointed in "Tehanu", in which I felt LeGuin had lost her feel for Earthsea. The short stories in "Tales of Earthsea" represented a fine return to form, and the new novel continues in that vein. As others have said, it's a treat to again meet characters from the previous books, especially Ged/Sparrowhawk as an old man whose Gontish neighbors call him Hawk. I couldn't put this book down: it should delight any Earthsea fan.
But I still don't think it's up to the level of the first three books, and it's not essential reading, as they definitely are. It's very good, and hardcore Earthsea fans will surely enjoy it... but I wouldn't recommend it unconditionally for EVERYONE, as I do "A Wizard of Earthsea".
Well done, Ursula!
Rating:
Summary: The Other Wind
Review: I thought that this book was excellent. It had action and fantesy all in one book. I have read all of the Earthsea books in a time period of 1 to 1 1/2 months. All of them have been excellent but I especially liked the last book. I started out reading the first book for summer reading and I got hooked! I hope that she makes another book for this series.
Rating:
Summary: A Wondrous Adventure
Review: Have you ever read a book that was so well crafted that at the end of a chapter, instead of charging into the next one, you paused and reflected on what you have read? Have you ever read a book where you were at the edge of laughter and tears on the same page? You can.Le Guin has taken the loose ends of her four earlier Earthsea novels and her recent collection of Earthsea short stories, combined those loose ends and your favorite characters from them with some serious thinking on the life and death, and created the finest Earthsea story to date. Alder is a "mender," a repairer of broken pots, a mere sorcerer, one who should never see the low wall that only wizards know, the wall that separates the living from the dead. Yet the wall and the dead torment his sleep. The dead call to him, asking to be set free and, most shockingly of all, his dead wife has kissed him across the wall of stones, something unknown in the history of Earthsea. The Patterner, one of the eight great wizards of Roke, the wizard's isle, has sent Alder to Ged. And while Ged may have lost his power of wizardry and be done with doing, his heart goes out to the tormented young man. He counsels him, finds him a temporary solution to his nightmares, and sends him to Havnor, to the King Lebannen. For Ged thinks that Alder may herald a change for Earthsea, one even greater than those Ged wrought. Alder meets other characters in his quest. Some are old friends of the reader: Tenar, from "The Tombs of Atuan" and "Tehanu;" Tehanu herself, who is somehow the daughter of Kalessin, the eldest dragon; Lebannen, the young king from "The Farthest Shore." Some are acquaintances from "Tales from Earthsea," most notably Irian, now Orm Irian. Others are new but no less wonderful: the young princess of the Kargish lands and, of course, Alder himself. Le Guin takes these characters, let's them grow and age, shows us time's marks upon them, and brings them into Alder's life and Alder's quest. And as Alder's quest grows beyond himself, to involve the living and the dead, indeed all the souls of Earthsea, so does the book's sense of wonder. Until, like Ged, in the moment just before the climax of the story, we will smile a little because like him we like that pause, "that fearful pause, the moment before things change." This is a masterly work, not just because of the clever use of characters or the wonderful plotting, but also because of the depth of the thinking that lies beyond and inside the story. It's about even more than life or death; it's also about the things we assume and take for granted because they have always been so, without ever asking if they are truly right. Alder's love for his dead wife has the power to change the world. What's no less wonderful is Le Guin's power to move the reader, to challenge and provoke us. Read and savor this book. It's the best Earthsea story to date. It might even be the best Le Guin to date.
Rating:
Summary: Not as strong, but still great
Review: Well, I liked it. I think certain aspects about Tenar's relationship with the Kargish princess could have been developed further, as well as deelings between the princess and King Lebannen, but on the whole, it was a wonderful book. I was a little disappointed by the lack of Ged in it, but then, the book wasn't about him. The book has charm, strength, and surprising bits of humor in it, that make it well worth the five stars I gave it.
Rating:
Summary: Fans of Earthsea will be thrilled
Review: I found The Other Wind unputdownable. First, you encounter every important character from the last five books: Ged from A Wizard of Earthsea; Tenar from The Tombs of Atuan; Lebannen from The Farthest Shore; Tehanu from Tehanu; and Irian and The Patterner from the "Dragonfly" novella in Tales from Earthsea. It's fascinating to see how Ged and Tenar, in particular, have changed over the entire series. First, they're very young adults, filled with potential and uncertainty. Then we rejoin Ged at the height of his power and knowledge in The Farthest Shore. Then we rejoin them both in Tehanu: in late middle age and filled with regret, they look back over their lost youth and struggle to find a lesser, yet deeper, path. In this book, we find them attaining the wisdom and clarity that can accompany old age: to them, only a few things matter now like their simple country life and their deep bond with each other. Also, in this book, it's a treat to see Lebannen again. I always wondered what kind of High King the cautious boy from The Farthest Shore turned out to be. Second, the reader finds the physical details of Earthsea sketched in even more strongly in this novel (and also in Tales of Earthsea, and somewhat in Tehanu whereas the first three books kept the setting simple). Here, you see Havnor, the King's city, in greater detail than ever before. You learn fascinating folklore about the witches and sorcerors who in previous books had faded into the background behind the wizards of Roke. You also get a much greater feel for the Kargs, the illiterate warrior people from whom Tenar escaped, in the marvelous new character of the Princess Seserahk. The plot itself concerns the righting of a great imbalance caused in the prehistory of Earthsea by the first wizards who, in their quest for power, may have tampered with disasterous results with the boundary between life and death. Here, Le Guin skillfully weaves in every dangling plot thread I had ever wondered about through the entire series. Like, why do the Hardic people practice wizardry and the Kargish people don't? Why is the afterlife (the place across the wall visited in The Farthest Shore) such a horrible lifeless place? Does everyone go there after death and if so, then why do the Kargs believe they reincarnate? What is at the bottom of the ever perilous relationship between dragons and humans and what is the real purpose of characters like Irian and Tehanu who seem something more than just dragon or just human? What was the price to pay for learning wizardry? This is a wonderful book, a true delight to Earthsea fans. It seems to be a true end to the series. However, if Le Guin is considering writing more, I'd love to urge her to go back and make a novel of the Patterner's story.
Rating:
Summary: Good But Not Outstanding
Review: Relatively late in life, LeGuin has returned to the fictional universes that made her famous; the Hainish future history that is the background to her recent novel The Telling, and now a new Earthsea fantasy novel. The Other Wind is a very ambitious novel and contains some fine writing but is not of the same quality as the previous Earthsea books. The story is set some years after the events in Tehanu, the previous Earthsea book, and is partially an effort to finish a plot line started in that book. In The Other Wind, several events are threatening the foundations of Earthsea. The barriers between the living and the dead are in danger of breaking down. The implicit truce between humans and dragons has frayed and dragons threaten the human occupied islands. The political structure of Earthsea is in flux with the consolidation of the reign of the King over the central archipelago and a formation of a new central monarchy in the Kargish archipelago. The basis of this problem is rooted in events which date to the beginnings of Earthsea and the discovery/invention of magic. As with the other Earthsea books, an important theme is the serious adverse consequences of using human magic to distort the natural world; an allegory of human exploitation of technology to master nature. The scope of the book and the ambitious nature of theme are part of the reason that The Other Wind is not as satisfying as the prior Earthsea books. The prior Earthsea books had a single central character and some type of quest in each volume. This book has a series of equally important characters worthy of a thick 19th century novel. The book is relatively short, which doesn't allow satisfactory development of some characters. The plot is complex and at times seems mechanical because of the rapid and terse manner in which events unfold. A longer, more complex book would really be necessary to do justice to the themes and characters in The Other Wind. The quality of writing is good but uneven. Some of it is very good, some merely good. The concluding sections are powerful. The concluding sections may feel familiar to some readers. Part of it deals with the liberation of the dead from a form of limbo. This is strikingly similar to events in Philip Pullman's recent book, The Amber Spyglass. LeGuin and Pullman both deal with the relationship of man to the natural world and the ambiguous effects of science/magic. It is interesting that both have arrived at a similar fictional solution to the problem of depicting the problems inherent in human efforts to understand and control the natural world.
Rating:
Summary: A Gentle Work of the Soul
Review: There is a quiet tenderness about this work--a stillness of spirit--that inspires both marvel and joy. After the plodding banality of Le Guin's previous novel "Tehanu", which all but ruined the world of Earthsea, this latest work is a resurrection.
One suspects that Le Guin wrote "Tehanu" as penance for making the first three books in the series so male-centric. The resulting novel straddled the worst of all worlds: combining insipid un-fantasy with a hectoring message that read like a sermon more than a work of speculative fiction. In "The Other Wind" she gets it right. This latest work contains themes similar to "Tehanu's", but they are shown rather than told, revealed rather than reproached. Le Guin also achieves a balance between the male and female perspectives that leaves one feeling enriched and not browbeaten. "The Other Wind" is an altogether nobler creature.
Le Guin's writing has always been in a class of its own, but here, it ages like fine wine. She writes with a poetic austerity that provokes affectionate admiration. Her characters live and move in three dimensions, and think and feel in a universe filled to overflowing with thinking and feeling.
This story is a philosophical reflection on life and death; not surprising since each book in the series was a similar reflection. But in this one, Le Guin resolves the open questions that she left unanswered in the previous works. I would have been perfectly happy with her leaving those questions unanswered--as incitements to thoughtful readers--but I am content that she has answered them, and in a way that is so complete and fulfilling, yet so totally consistent with the world of Earthsea. This work inspires metaphysical reflections, yet does not demand them. It can be read as a simple story of courage, compassion and resourcefulness, or as an existential allegory of Being and Nothingness. Indeed, it is both: the genius of the author resides in her ability to meld story and philosophy so flawlessly that the novel speaks to us on both the simple and the profound.
This is the kind of patient gentle writing that will appeal only to those in no hurry. Containing little of adventure or intrigue, it is the work of an author who is "done with doing" but, fortunately, not done with living or with writing.
There are quibbles. As a stand-alone novel, it is confusing and too dependent on the reader's familiarity with the preceding works, and the prose is sometimes so austere that it hazards obscurity. But such blemishes are niggling. The novel as a whole is a mature piece of art--a gentle work of the soul that embodies a lifetime of reflection on what it means to live, to create, to face death and to touch those whom we cherish.
Rating:
Summary: The master doesn't know where to start
Review: I'll be straight with you, I did not finish this book. Why didn't I finish it? Because LeGuin burried me in backstory. There is a rule that every writer should know, "if that is the story you want to tell, tell it, don't refer back to it." Now I understand that this is just a follow up to her original trilogy, but she puts in so much narrative filled with explanations of the past that you begin to wonder what happened to the current story. LeGuin is an amazing storyteller, and her ideas seemed to have a lot going for them. Her descriptions were vivid, and the storyline was good. Even the characters were intriguing, but like I said, she starts and stops the story so often that you eventually get tired of it and toss in the towel. As a stand alone novel, I'd give it a thumbs down. Maybe I'll go back and read the trilogy and then be pulled through this novel, but somehow I'm doubting that.
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