A Wizard of Earthsea - Ursula K. Le Guin

Rating: 3

I am probably one of the last people to read this book, and am a little ashamed to say it is the first of Ursula Le Guin's work that I have read. But I got there eventually!

The first in Le Guin's Earthsea Quartet, A Wizard of Earthsea was written in the 1960's, and has had a major impact on fantasy writing in the decades since.

The Wizard of Earthsea is the story of Sparrowhawk, who we meet as a young boy on the island of Gont. Sparrowhawk discovers that he has a talent for magic but his only teacher is an old village witch, until he uses his gift to save village from attack by foreign invaders. He is physically drained and injured by the feat, and is only saved by a mage, Ogion the Silent, who hears of the boy's skills. Ogion takes the boy as his apprentice, giving him his true name, Ged, but the boy is frustrated by the pace of his training. Ogion gives Ged the choice of staying with him, or travelling to study in a school for wizards on the Island of Roke.

Ged leaves for Roke, where he learns the craft very quickly, but his arrogance causes him to attempt a spell that is beyond his skills to control, to conjure a dead spirit. The result is a terrifying creature being unleashed, and it is only the Archmage who saves him, but not before the creature escapes. Racked with guilt and fear, Ged must leave the school and enter the world with the threat of the creature hanging over him. Ged is now a powerful wizard, but his strength is tested against a family of dragons, a strange evil force and the creature that is still hunting him.

I enjoyed the story, the battles that Ged has to face in his struggle for survival, but I never felt truly involved. The writing was beautiful, but the characters felt a little distant to me, so that I was never drawn in as with other fantasy series I have read. Ogion was probably the only character I was ever really interested in learning more about. Other tales in the Quartet have been recommended to me, so I will probably read the others, but am not in quite so much of a hurry!