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This book never really feels like book #4 in the Earthsea Cycle to me. The first hundred pages or so did not feel needed. The darkness, sexuality, and gender role issues in this book, though valid on their own merits, felt really out of place to me in this fantasy world. It would be like if Wicked were the fourth sequel in the Oz series. The political and social agendas do not jive with the previous books.

My other gripe is that this book would have been infinitely more entertaining if it had been written from Tehanu's perspective. The other three books are written in this way, from Ged to Tenar to the young prince. The logical, pattern-driven expectation is that Tehanu should be next in a line of perspectives. Getting to know the classic characters and seeing the stressful situations through her eyes would have been so much better. Instead we get Tenar again. She is old and bitter at the world.


**SPOILERS**

Also, to those who would say that Tehanu's perspective would give away too much to soon concerning her true nature as a dragon person, I have two things to say. One, Le Guin spills the beans early on with the folktale of the fisher woman and Tehanu's continued interest in said dragon people. Two, imagine how much more entertaining and unique it would have been to get inside the mind of this new creature for more than just the last eight pages of the book. What is her opinion on Ged, the broken hero of the series? What does she think of Tenar, the former priestess of darkness, as a foster mother? One of Kurt Vonnegut's rules on writing is not to leave the reader in the dark, but to tell your audience as much as you can as fast as you can. I can see the merit of that rule clearly through the follies of this novel.