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connor1736 's review for:
The Farthest Shore
by Ursula K. Le Guin
I didn't enjoy this book as much as the first two in the series. The Farthest Shore shares many of the same strengths as them: amazing settings and imagery, beautifully written prose, and thought-provoking themes and dialogue. In fact, I would say that the imagery of this book was better than the other two, especially past the halfway point. The rafts, the dragon run, and finally the were all just so cool! I also just love Le Guin's depiction of dragons in this series, and you see the most of them here.
However, I found Le Guin's almost poetic writing to be a bit of a hindrance in The Farthest Shore. I sometimes found it difficult to follow what exactly was happening. There were a few moments that just baffled me because things seemed to contradict what had happened earlier, so I had to go back several pages to try to figure out what Le Guin actually meant.
Another flaw with this book was some of the characters. Ged, who plays an important role in the other two books, was great here. However, I found it hard to care for the main character of this book, Arren. I simply could not relate to him as well as Ged in the first book, or Tenar in the second. He does sometimes have his own complicated internal conflicts, sure, but they seemed so much more superficial than those of the earlier books. I also just did not understand this book's antagonist. In the first two books, the biggest enemies were the main characters themselves. In The Farthest Shore, the villain is someone/something else. But as was the case for Arren, I felt that the antagonist of this book was not very well-developed.
Spoiler
Mountains of PainHowever, I found Le Guin's almost poetic writing to be a bit of a hindrance in The Farthest Shore. I sometimes found it difficult to follow what exactly was happening. There were a few moments that just baffled me because things seemed to contradict what had happened earlier, so I had to go back several pages to try to figure out what Le Guin actually meant.
Another flaw with this book was some of the characters. Ged, who plays an important role in the other two books, was great here. However, I found it hard to care for the main character of this book, Arren. I simply could not relate to him as well as Ged in the first book, or Tenar in the second. He does sometimes have his own complicated internal conflicts, sure, but they seemed so much more superficial than those of the earlier books. I also just did not understand this book's antagonist. In the first two books, the biggest enemies were the main characters themselves. In The Farthest Shore, the villain is someone/something else. But as was the case for Arren, I felt that the antagonist of this book was not very well-developed.